'I Don't Want to Think That He's Dead': A Trip to the Home Barrio of Oscar Taveras

People in the neighborhood still talk about the time in 2012 when El Locon made his first appearance on national television in the Dominican Republic. He was just 20 years old then, in his first season with the Aguilas Cibaeñas of the Dominican winter league, and on the cusp of stardom. He looked nervous because he wasn't yet accustomed to such attention, although he wasn't shy.

There were times growing up when he'd appear randomly on a neighbor's doorstep, anxious to play some type of game, whether it was baseball or "plaquita," the street version of cricket that's popular in the area. As a child, his mother could rarely get him to sit still. Nor was it unusual for him to stop by somebody's house for some rice and beans—arroz con habichuelas—because the boy could really eat. He didn't grow to be 6'2'' by chance.

Yet in the presence of cameras, outside of his beloved hometown, El Locon could seem lost. But everyone knew that he would need to get used to the attention. Soon he would become known throughout the entire baseball world as one of the top prospects in the game.

And while everyone swears they remember his first few moments on camera, in truth they only remember his first few words, the first question he answered in his first interview.

"So, where are you from?" the broadcaster asked.

Without hesitation, he replied, "From the Los Castillos neighborhood of Sosua."

The answer drew cheers from across the neighborhood. El Locon had made it big, and in a way, so had Los Castillos. The boy had shown everyone that he had not forgotten his roots. He could have very easily just said Sosua, and nobody would have thought much of it. But he didn't. And the way he emphasized "Los Castillos" brought a little bit of pride to the neighborhood.

People began to dream of the day when El Locon would make it to the big leagues because they knew that when they asked him on American television where he was from, he would answer in the same way he had in 2012. El Locon would never change. He would always be the native son.

Oscar Taveras loved his barrio, and the people of Los Castillos loved him.

The music began to play again at Dyess Bar Café, a local hangout tucked into the corner of a building only a few steps away from the baseball field. For the past several weeks the neighborhood had been quiet, except for the sobbing. There were a lot of tears shed at Dyess, and around the neighborhood after people learned that their beloved Oscar had died in a car accident on October 26. He was 22.

But life goes on, and people have to go on, too. So once again, rhythmic Latin dance music played from the speaker on the doorstep, bass thumping, and the click and clack of billiard balls interrupted the loud conversations typical of any Saturday afternoon here.

The best way for people in Los Castillos to remember former St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Oscar Taveras has been to act as if he had not died. To continually expect Taveras to walk into Dyess to organize a baseball game at the nearby field. But while the music played again, the field was still empty. Most people couldn't get themselves to go back there because it reminded them too much of El Locon—the crazy one.

"For me, I don't want to think that he's dead," 24-year-old Jonathan Nicasio Batista, one of the bar patrons and one of Taveras' many childhood friends, said in Spanish. "And I can tell you that this is how most people see it. He was such a great person."

People inside Dyess pointed out that the walls of the bar are adorned with photos of Taveras. He was truly beloved.

Los Castillos is an idyllic, small barrio in the far north of the Dominican Republic, a suburb of Sosua, adjacent to the resort town of Puerto Plata. Children are born here, grow up here, and then live their entire lives here. People rarely leave Los Castillos. The town is comfortable and peaceful. Crime is rare.

Many residents work as motorbike taxi drivers, which is why you'll see and hear many zipping by. Others work in the tourism industry or at one of the nearby factories. This is not a wealthy part of Sosua, yet people speak of their neighborhood with reverence. Residents are proud to be from Los Castillos and they were proud of its most famous son, the one who got out and made it big.

"We miss him dearly," Nicasio Batista said.

Less than half a mile from Dyess, at the top of a hill, Maricela Cabrera wept. Taveras' mother spent part of that Saturday afternoon sitting on a chair on her front patio talking to her niece Elbia Dominga Cabrera, who was cradling her young baby. Taveras had built the tiled patio for his mother with some of his baseball earnings. His wealth helped turn the fortunes of the entire family.

At times Cabrera forced a smile. Mostly, she said nothing.

"She's still struggling," Dominga Cabrera said in Spanish. "We try to make her laugh. But sometimes we can't. She cries a lot. There's are so many remembrances of him here in this town."

In the past several weeks, Cabrera has received phone calls from many famous baseball figures from both the Dominican and the United States, which has brought some comfort.

"It felt good because so many people loved my son," Cabrera said. "It showed me that they loved him so much."

On Thursday, Cabrera went to her son's grave—which naturally is in Los Castillos—and lit two candles. But she still could not get herself to recount the good memories.

"It's very difficult for me to talk about him," she says.

At age 12, Taveras left Los Castillos to go live with his father Francisco Taveras in Canada. Taveras was eager to see what the world was like away from Los Castillos, and he wanted to be with his father. He eventually returned to his neighborhood three years later after realizing the outside world wasn't so welcoming, and that his mother had been the center of his world.

"I missed him so much," Cabrera said of that three-year absence.

But now this was far worse. He would never come back.

"Where's Ronny?" one boy inside Dyess asked. "He's supposed to be here. Somebody call him."

Several boys called but there was no answer. Everybody is worried about Ronny Peñalo these days.

"He's not the same," Nicasio Batista said. "They were such good friends. When you see something like that it affects you. He still plays ball with us, but you can tell he's not the same. He used to talk a lot. Not anymore. He still chills with us, but not in the same way."

Eventually, Peñalo appeared, and like Nicasio Batista described, he was sad and sullen. He struggled to make eye contact. Mostly, he looked toward the ground.

"We knew each other since I've had the ability to have any memories," Peñalo said of Taveras.

On the day Taveras was scheduled to leave for Canada to live with his father, the two friends spent the day crying. Neither wanted to say goodbye.

When Taveras—who had been extremely homesick in those three years out of the country and experienced what he believed to be racism, which had made him even more loyal to his hometown—returned from Canada, he dropped his bags off at his house and immediately went to visit Peñalo. The two went from house to house that day celebrating the return.

In his three years abroad, Taveras had grown both physically and mentally. The boy who had left Los Castillos had returned as almost a man at 15. Very quickly he caught the attention of baseball scouts. One day after he had finished practicing in Santiago, Taveras called Peñalo to ask him to arrange a baseball game for the following day at the local field. Taveras took a bus and arrived the following afternoon. The friends spent the day playing ball. The custom was for the losing team to pay for soft drinks and snacks after the game.

But when the game was finished, Taveras told everyone: "Nobody is paying for anything."

Peñalo asked, "Why are you so happy?"

"Boys," Taveras said, "I just signed a professional contract."

And sure enough, nobody paid for anything that day.

Peñalo laughed when he recalled how he had to convince Taveras to make the trip to the United States when the Cardinals assigned him to play for the Johnson City, Tennessee team of the Appalachian League in 2010. Taveras—whose experience in Canada had made him weary of the outside world—did not want to go. Eventually he relented. But he and Peñalo spoke at least twice a day that season.

It remained that way for Taveras' entire time in the minors.

Last year, Peñalo and Taveras cousin Ambioris Cabrera got a cryptic phone call from Taveras in late May.

"Are you guys prepared for some news?" he asked.

"What news?" Peñalo responded.

"I'm serious, are you ready for news?" Taveras said.

"Did you get released?" Peñalo asked.

Taveras laughed and responded, "I got called up to the big leagues."

Nobody could hear each other on the phone because all three started yelling.

The 2014 season ended up being bittersweet for Taveras, who had been proud of his call up, but was disappointed that he had not always lived up to expectations. He hit just .239 with a .590 OPS in 248 plate appearances.

Taveras told Peñalo that he believed he could give more. So as soon as he returned home in mid-October after the Cardinals' playoff loss to the San Francisco Giants, Taveras and the 20-year-old Peñalo—who had been trying to sign a professional contract—began training. The two friends would go up to a field in Puerto Plata to practice. At the end of a long week of training, Taveras told Peñalo that they should go out to the river nearby and roast a pig over the weekend. He wanted to celebrate his newfound commitment to training with people from the neighborhood. Peñalo thought it was a great idea.

So on Sunday, October 26, Taveras, his girlfriend Edilia Arvelo, and nine other friends made their way to the Rio Jamao, about an hour drive from Los Castillos. The group drove in three separate cars because Taveras insisted on driving his red Camaro.

They arrived at 1 p.m. and drank some beers and ate some pig.

"I had never seen him so happy," Peñalo recalled. "He spent the entire day laughing. He just savored spending the day with the people he most enjoyed being with."

By 5 p.m. the group decided to go home because it had started raining. The plan was for one car to drive in front of Taveras' Camaro and for another, Peñalo's SUV, to drive behind him. The friends feared that Taveras would try to drive too fast. Everyone knew Taveras had a weakness for speeding.

By the time everyone had hopped in the car, the rain had become a downpour. Just before the group took off, a group of fans approached Taveras' car and asked for an autograph.

Peñalo recalled ominously that one older fan told Taveras, "Listen, you need to drive that car slowly. That type of car isn't built for the roads around here."

Eventually, Taveras finished signing the autographs and the group took off just as planned, with the Camaro bookended by the two other cars. Almost immediately though, Peñalo grew nervous. His visibility in the rain was severely limited.

The group started off driving just 20 to 25 miles per hour. But the slow speed must have frustrated Taveras because he raced ahead of the car in front of him after only a few minutes on the road.

Several minutes later, Peñalo and Ambioris Cabrera, Taveras' cousin who was riding in the SUV, noticed a bright light on the side of the road ahead.

"What's that light?" Cabrera asked.

But the two quickly realized that it wasn't a light. It was a car; a red car that had crashed into a tree on the side of the road. Peñalo pulled over and the two got out of the SUV and ran toward the crashed Camaro.

Peñalo first saw Arvelo's body sprawled on the floor. She had been propelled out of the car upon impact and was undoubtedly dead.

"There was nothing we could do for her," Peñalo said.

Peñalo and Cabrera then looked inside the Camaro and saw Taveras' lifeless body. They carefully pulled the body out of the car and carried it into the SUV.

"There were no vital signs," Peñalo said. "But we tried to see if there was anything that could be done for him."

They drove to a nearby hospital and Peñalo ran inside to get a doctor. The doctor rushed to the car, but he quickly realized that Taveras was dead. There was no need for a stretcher.

It fell on Peñalo to call Taveras' mother. She arrived shortly with Taveras' cousin, sobbing from the moment she entered the hospital.

Peñalo gave her a hug, but said nothing.

"To see someone in that state, it's difficult to say anything," Peñalo said.

Word spread quickly in Los Castillos. The owner of Dyess received a Whatsapp message and told everyone in the bar. People cried in the streets.

El Locon was gone.

The days following the accident have been very difficult for Peñalo. He struggles to understand what's happened. He thought about quitting baseball because stepping on the field reminded him too much of his best friend. His friends and family have convinced him that Taveras would have wanted him to keep playing. So he continues to practice, and he recently received great news. He has been accepted to play at a junior college in Iowa. How he wished he could tell Taveras.

"Sometimes I sit at home waiting for him to appear," he said.

Last week, a toxicology report was released that said Taveras had five times the legal limit of alcohol in his blood on the day of the accident. This was confusing to Peñalo. He saw his friend drink only two or three beers that day at the river. He cried when he read the news stories.

"He can't defend himself," he said.

Peñalo swears that Taveras was not drunk when he got into the Camaro that day. And now Peñalo fears people will have a false impression of his friend. Sure, Taveras liked to have some drinks on the weekend, he said, but he did not have a drinking problem.

"There will be people who were his fans, who never even met him, who are going to ask themselves how they could have rooted for some alcoholic," Peñalo said. "And it's not true."

But life goes on. After some soul searching, Peñalo said he has become more focused than ever on signing a professional contract.

"I'm no longer just trying to live out my dream, but now I'm living out his dream too," he said.

He paused to compose himself. His bottom lip puffed out in a pout. He couldn't help it. But at that moment, Peñalo looked up and saw that some kids had started playing baseball. He was reminded of his childhood games with Taveras.

As the sound of a bat smacking a ball reverberated throughout the empty streets, Peñalo said that Taveras took a lot of pride and joy in watching young boys and girls play baseball. Especially kids from Los Castillos.