The White Sox add to their Cuban connection

Jose Abreu is a first baseman, after all, not a livery driver. He is also very well paid and easily could have arranged a limo.

But when the Chicago White Sox called Yoan Moncada to the majors in July, Abreu chose the personal touch.

“He was the most famous Uber driver at the airport,” general manager Rick Hahn said. “He has very clearly taken Yoan under his wing and sort of shepherded him through being a big leaguer.”

Moncada, 22, had gotten to know Abreu last spring training, after the White Sox acquired him in a trade with the Boston Red Sox for Chris Sale, the elite left-hander. Moncada — a native of Cuba, like Abreu — said that when Abreu called him after his promotion, he insisted on being the first one to greet him in Chicago.

“He said: ‘I’m gonna do it. I’m gonna be there for you,'” Moncada said at Camelback Ranch this week, through team interpreter Billy Russo. “That was a very special moment for me. I wasn’t expecting that from him.”

This year in camp, Abreu and Moncada have been there for another Cuban defector: Luis Robert, 20, who signed with the White Sox last May for a $26 million bonus, plus a $25.2 million tax for exceeding their allotted international bonus pool. The players dress in a row in the first three lockers by the clubhouse door — Abreu, Robert and Moncada — with small Cuban flags affixed to their nameplates.

“When my agent asked me what team I wanted to choose, I told him the White Sox,” Robert said Wednesday, through Russo, before hitting a grand slam in an exhibition game.

The locker arrangement neatly symbolizes this moment for the White Sox: one established star (Abreu), one budding star (Moncada) and one star-in-waiting (Robert). The White Sox are not quite ready to contend, but they have finished the major trades that will shape their next core, with Cuba as the backdrop.

“When I first came here and met Minnie Minoso, he was a big Cuban legend on this team,” Abreu said, through Russo. “He told me that this team was very good at taking care of the Cuban guys, because they like the way we, as Cubans, play — and I can tell you that it’s true. This team does all that you need as a Cuban to feel comfortable.”

White Sox manager Rick Renteria was born in California to parents from Mexico. The team won the 2005 World Series under Ozzie Guillen, who is from Venezuela. And the imprint of Minoso lives on.

A nine-time All-Star, Minoso played 12 seasons for the White Sox, his first in 1951 and his last a cameo in 1980. Cuban pitchers Jose Contreras and Orlando Hernandez helped lead the White Sox to their World Series title in 2005, and on multiple occasions in 2014, the team used four Cuban players in the same lineup — Abreu, Alexei Ramirez, Dayan Viciedo and Adrian Nieto. No other team had done that in 45 years.

Minoso, who lived in Chicago year-round before his death in 2015, spoke before one of those games about his pride in that lineup. He shared his advice for his successors with the White Sox.

“Be in love with the game,” Minoso said. “Do everything beautiful for the game and the people and the country you represent. That’s what I want everyone to do.”

In 2013, Abreu defected by boat to Haiti from Cuba, where he had starred for Cienfuegos of Serie Nacional and made about $20 a month. On his flight to the United States, where a six-year, $68 million contract with the White Sox awaited, he swallowed a page of his passport because it contained a false name. He did not want to risk jeopardizing the deal.

That revelation, which Abreu made last year at the smuggling and conspiracy trial of an agent and trainer, underscored the desperation of Cubans to leave a country that prevents them from seeking their market value. Abreu has made good on the White Sox’ investment; he is the only player in the majors to hit at least .290 with 25 homers and 100 runs batted in in each of the last four seasons. Listening to Minoso, he said, helped his transition.

“When I first came here, he was a person who gave me the trick to have success in this country, and in the major leagues: work hard, respect and punctuality,” Abreu said. “Those are the three keys I’ve been trying to pass to Yoan and Robert, and all the people around me, too, because I know it’s true. I’ve applied them, and I’ve enjoyed the success I’ve enjoyed because of it.”

The White Sox have changed over nearly their entire roster since Abreu arrived. They have not reached the playoffs since 2008 and tried veteran imports for years, even as recently as 2016, when they dealt Fernando Tatis Jr. — now considered one of baseball’s 10 best prospects — to San Diego for James Shields, an expensive starter who has gone 9-19 for Chicago.

But Hahn had a ticket out of persistent mediocrity: modestly paid, high-impact players with multiple years of club control. From December 2016 through last July, he traded Sale, outfielder Adam Eaton, starter Jose Quintana and relievers Tommy Kahnle and David Robertson for an avalanche of prospects who have lifted the White Sox from 23rd in Baseball America’s 2016 farm system rankings to fourth (behind Atlanta, the Yankees and San Diego) this spring.

Now, they wait.

“The final stage, where you start adding to this young core at the big-league level with premium free-agent talent, that’s exciting, because you’re getting close,” Hahn said. “It’s this in-between stage — when you have to show patience and let player development take its course — that’s perhaps the most challenging of the whole thing.”

Another challenge could be re-signing their team leader, although Abreu, who can be a free agent after the 2019 season, has no plans to leave. He changed his diet this winter and shed 10 pounds.

“My parents taught me to always be grateful, and I’m very grateful to this organization,” he said. “I would like to play for this team for a very, very long time and to be here when this organization wins a championship. That’s my goal.”

Moncada, a chiseled second baseman with speed, power and plate discipline, is likely to lead off in what should be his first full major league season. He said he was worried that Abreu might be traded but thrilled that the White Sox spared him from their teardown.

He said he has tried to adhere to the advice Abreu gave him on their ride from the airport to his future.

“I told him the only thing you need is to keep your focus 100 percent on the game,” Abreu said. “That’s the only thing that he needs because baseball has given us an opportunity to be here and accomplish so many things.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.