“We regard this to be the highest award that can be given to a major league player,” commissioner Rob Manfred said.
Betts and his wife, Brianna, founded the 5050 Foundation in 2021. They work helping children with emotional and physical issues. They’ve also continued to support the homeless and most recently victims of the fires in Los Angeles earlier this year.
Betts also works with high school athletes on improving their grades and has partnered with the Obama Foundation to provide equipment to young athletes in his home state of Tennessee.
The “Betts On Us Fund” at UCLA Children’s Hospital supports families of pediatric patients who need financial assistance.
They’ve sponsored AAU basketball teams, charity bowling tournaments and even refurbished the baseball field at John Muir High School, Jackie Robinson’s alma mater.
“Mookie has been an unbelievable ambassador for our game,” Manfred said.
The Red Sox traded Betts to the Dodgers before the 2020 season. Betts has been a centerpiece for two World Series winners since and is playing for his fourth ring this week.
All he’s done this season is make the full-timeswitch from right field to shortstop and become a Gold Glove finalist.
Luis Clemente was at Dodger Stadium representing his family when Betts received his award. As a Clemente Award winner, Betts will wear Clemente’s retired No. 21 on the back of his cap.
Betts had a rough first half of the season at the plate this year. But his work with the foundation kept it in perspective.
“My on-the-field things are irrelevant to [helping others],” he said. “You can still be successful and maybe not in a way that you didn’t know. It’s just really cool to be able to hold up this award and to know that this had nothing to do with baseball.”
Red Sox manager Alex Cora, who grew up hearing stories about Clemente’s legacy from his father, texted Betts to congratulate him.
“He told me I’m a ‘Rican now,” Betts said, laughing.
Betts is an eight-time All-Star with a Most Valuable Player award, six Gold Gloves and seven Silver Sluggers in his trophy case.
But the players will tell you the Clemente Award is special.
“It means a lot. Life is about more than kind of what you do, I think, as far as work. It’s about how you affect people,” Betts said.
“People always remember how you make them feel. So I know we live by that. So when we come across people, we always make them smile, do what you can to help them, and the Lord blesses you.”
Previous Clemente Award winners include Lou Brock, Willie Mays, Cal Ripken Jr., and Brooks Robinson along with Red Sox players David Ortiz and Tim Wakefield.
When Betts received his award on the field before Game 3 of the World Series, he was introduced as “our guy, Mookie Betts” to the cheering crowd at Dodger Stadium.
It’s a painful reminder to Red Sox fans of the foolish trade that sent their guy to Los Angeles. That the Sox ultimately got little back in the trade is secondary to the idea that he was traded in the first place.
Even now, six years later, it’s hard to understand the Sox didn’t realize they were making a franchise-altering mistake, that nobody in the room stood up and said they had to find a way to make it work.
It’s no coincidence the Sox have had only two winning seasons since trading Betts and haven’t come close to winning the division.
The Sox chose instead to build their team around Rafael Devers, giving him a $313.5 million contract then trading him to the Giants less than three years later based on character issues.
They’re on a better path now and have grasped the importance of keeping good players — and good people — with the extensions for Roman Anthony and Garrett Crochet.
It shouldn’t have taken trading a player who was recognized on Monday for representing all that’s good about the game.