The nonprofit Project Club Clemente took a moment to reflect ahead of the new year, honoring Puerto Rican Baseball Hall of Fame player Roberto Clemente, who played as a right fielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates for 18 seasons.<\/p>\n
Clemente was a member of the exclusive 3,000-hit club, as well as a sportsman and a humanitarian.<\/p>\n
What You Need To Know<\/p>\n
On Dec. 31, 1972, 38-year-old baseball legend Roberto Clemente chartered a flight to deliver emergency relief goods for the survivors of a massive earthquake in Nicaragua that killed thousands
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The plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean shortly after it took off from Puerto Rico. Clemente’s body was never found
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This year\u2019s annual New Year\u2019s Eve Project Club Clemente Breakfast honored former Bronx Assemblyman Jose Rivera with the Clemente Award
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Project Club Clemente is a nonprofit based in the Bronx which aims to celebrate and promote the legacy of Number 21<\/p>\n
“We consider him the pulse of Major League Baseball,” Eliezer Rodriguez, who founded Project Club Clemente, told NY1. “What every ball player ought to be like when they’re not wearing a uniform.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rodriguez\u2019s nonprofit, based in the Bronx, aims to celebrate and promote the legacy of Number 21.<\/p>\n
Bronx Borough President Vanessa Gibson came to their New Year\u2019s Eve breakfast to support the organization.<\/p>\n
\u201cProject Club Clemente is important because it’s a mission-based organization,” Gibson said. “It’s driven by the understanding that we can use baseball and sports as a mechanism to provide opportunities for young people.”<\/p>\n
On Dec. 31, 1972, 38-year-old Clemente chartered a flight to deliver emergency relief goods for the survivors of a massive earthquake in Nicaragua that killed thousands.<\/p>\n
The plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean shortly after it took off from Puerto Rico. His body was never found.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s poetic, because he played for the Pirates for 18 years, and he was buried at sea,\u201d Rodriguez said. \u201cOn that day, baseball lost a star, America lost a hero, the world lost a great humanitarian, and Puerto Rico, we lost a native son. This is our 53rd anniversary of his remembrance, and his legacy gets stronger year after year.\u201d<\/p>\n
This year\u2019s annual New Year\u2019s Eve Project Club Clemente Breakfast celebrated the 20-year anniversary of “The Flight for Humanity,” which completed the mission that took Clemente\u2019s life.<\/p>\n
Led by Rodriguez and Clemente\u2019s son, Roberto Clemente Jr., the mission delivered 16,000 pounds of aid to Nicaragua.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Clemente] played baseball as a means to an end, and the end was to help the less fortunate,” Rodriguez said. “He believed that we have to help those that are in need, so we’re trying to do that.”<\/p>\n
The breakfast honored former Bronx Assemblyman Jose Rivera with the Clemente Award. Rodriguez said Rivera is the person who established the name for \u201cThe Flight for Humanity,\u201d and initially was able to help get them an aircraft for the mission.<\/p>\n
Rivera is currently 89 years old. Rodriguez said he deserves to be recognized.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s a great feeling to be here,\u201d Rivera said. \u201cPeople gathering here are people dedicated to the Bronx, dedicated to the community. Dedicated to making life and this better for all of us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Project Club Clemente is working on plans to build a brick-and-mortar museum in the Bronx called the Clemente Pavillion to honor Clemente\u2019s legacy and highlight all Hispanic MLB players.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The nonprofit Project Club Clemente took a moment to reflect ahead of the new year, honoring Puerto Rican…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":86114,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[2296,11101,25,128,3691,231,9,24,12,63,319,129,131,130,27,200],"class_list":{"0":"post-86113","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-the-bronx","8":"tag-app-human-interest","9":"tag-app-sports","10":"tag-app-top-stories","11":"tag-bronx","12":"tag-emma-barnett","13":"tag-human-interest","14":"tag-new-york","15":"tag-new-york-city","16":"tag-news","17":"tag-nyc","18":"tag-sports","19":"tag-the-bronx","20":"tag-the-bronx-headlines","21":"tag-the-bronx-news","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-vod"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86113\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/86114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}