In memory of the outstanding pitcher, who died on August 31, 2021 due to COVID-19
The Costa Acosta family knew how to guide nine children along the path of honesty and kindness, most of whom took the path of sports. Reinaldo, the fifth of the brothers, was not sure from the beginning what discipline to cling to because boxing, basketball, volleyball, athletics and even judo filled his eyes, but it was finally baseball that caught him.
At the age of 10 or 11, he fell in love with the sport of balls and strikes, perhaps due to genetics – his grandfather, his father and his older brothers dedicated their lives to baseball – although Reinaldo was convinced that he had been born to shine in the diamonds, which, in fact, became his sanctuary.
On the field, the lanky young man tried just about every position, from outfield to third base to shortstop. However, Santos Iglesias, one of the most well-known baseball promoters in the northern area of Volunteer, suggested that the most appropriate thing for him was to get on the mound to pitch.
“I was not exactly a pyramid athlete, that is, I was not at the EIDE (School Sports Initiation School), nor at the ESPA (School of Athletic Improvement). He was studying in Havana and this meant that he did not go through those schools. I played in the 11-12 year old and youth categories, but not in 13-14 because the celebration of those championships coincided with the final exams of my career”, Costa told us.
In 1975, shortly after finishing his studies in the country’s capital, one of his brothers introduced him to nothing more and nothing less than the seasoned pitching coach José Manuel Cortina, mentor of the youth cast at the time. In just 24 hours, the team that he directed left to participate in the National Championship of the category.
“Cortina tells my brother that he was going to test me. He asked me to warm up well. I didn’t even throw five pitches, I think, when he told me: ‘Stop it, you’re leaving with me tomorrow.’
“That’s how I even got to be part of the youth national pre-selection that year and also the next, although in the end I couldn’t make a team. In my last course in the category, I reached the national series with Forestales, in 1977”.
Long ago, with always optimistic and winning thoughts, Costa did not stop repeating to himself that when he reached the national series teams, then the province was going to begin the harvest of titles… and so it was. While with the Forestales, Vegueros won their first championship in the 1977-’78 season, which marks the beginning of a glorious era for Pinar del Río.
In the midst of that spiral of triumphs and the consolidation of stars in the land of Vuelta Baja, Costa focused on learning from everyone around him, particularly Julio Romero and Jesús Guerra, his patterns to follow. Reinaldo insisted on imitating everything they did on top of a mound. His teammates told him that Guerra was crazy and he asked: “What does that crazy guy have that I can’t do?”
“Observing and learning, I managed to perfect the fastball on the side of the arm, and the three-quarter slider, also lateral, the pitches that I used the most. Those were my weapons, in addition to the sinker, which I was very good at. There is something curious that has been happening for a long time and it is the definition of the term breaking by sports commentators and narrators.
“Since in reality many do not know the type of pitch that, outside the fastball, pitchers throw in the game, it was much more comfortable for them to take advantage of said definition and thus not fall into the error of naming one when in reality it is another. shipment made”, said Costa, always analytical.
And beyond his colleagues, Reinaldo was also very receptive to the advice of the four men who directed him in his brilliant career. He makes no difference between them, because he had in all of them the necessary support for his development. The term trust was always found in Cortina, José Miguel Pineda and Jorge Fuentes, without forgetting Juan Charles Díaz, his mentor in Forestales, who, despite how aggressive and desperate he looked on many occasions, always showed wisdom at the right time. to make a decision.
Any anecdote with them?
“It would never end, but I’ll give you an example: for me Pineda was something like a kind of foresight, he anticipated what could happen later. Imagine that in my first Selective Series he tells me: `Child, get ready, you are going to pitch here´. My first start was against Las Villas with the bases loaded and I made a balk.
“It was the movement or the action that decided the ball game. He put his hand on my shoulder and said, `Nothing happened; get ready that tomorrow you go again´. Thanks to him I became a better pitcher. I am very pleased not to have disappointed the total trust he placed in me”.
But the sports life of Reinaldo Costa was not a bed of roses. In fact, his career was interrupted between 1978 and 1981, a period in which he was doing military service. According to his own words, that stage served for his later takeoff as one of the best pitchers in Cuba.
As soon as in 1981 he reached the national pre-selection and had the opportunity to cut his teeth next to the great stars of Antillean pitching. That gave him a quality plus, he helped him grow to give a definitive blow in the 1983-’84 campaign, during which he won 14 games in the National Series and 12 in the Selective, unceremoniously making him the team’s first pitcher. Cuba.
That poster was confirmed at the World Cup in Havana, where he won the triple crown and the world title, two awards that he always kept as the pinnacle of his journey with the four-letter shirt.
At the domestic level, he won three National Series titles between 1984 and 1988, with the only spot of the 1986 season, that of Agustín Marquetti’s mythical home run against Rogelio García. As is logical, the main memory of that decisive game was the hit by the blue starter, but Costa was one of the protagonists of the duel as the starter for the Vegueros.
When and why the withdrawal?
“I made the decision three years later. Despite my injuries, in ’88 I ended up being the best pitcher in the country again and, unbelievably, the following year, I found myself the 14th or 15th pitcher in the discussion to join the roster of the team from Pinar del Rio for the Series National. I wanted to say that it was no longer in the plans and that’s when I start thinking seriously about retirement.”
Reinaldo Costa shared his experiences for two years with the Isla de la Juventud team. In one of them, the Pirates came to discuss the title of the National Series. He also served as coach of Cienfuegos, although his departure from the Elefantes was not on the best terms.
“I came to Cienfuegos because Alain Álvarez, the team manager, contacted me after they told him about my previous results, especially on the Island. I had planned to work for the Development League team in Pinar and he insisted : `Think about it, you are going to be the team’s head coach´. I thought about it well, I consulted with the family. Everyone agreed and I went to Cienfuegos. The purpose was to improve the 15th place obtained in the previous campaign and I told Alain that it could be achieved”, said Costa.
What prompted your abrupt departure from the Elephants?
“Look, with the scourge of the pandemic came a whole cumbersome quarantine process, which kept me away from the management body for a few weeks. My last PCR was negative, but the hotel where the team was staying was occupied and there was no other place to stay.
“My disagreement began, the uncertainty of what was going to happen until I said: ‘If you don’t have a place to keep me, then send me back to Pinar.’ But that happened and when we arrived in Sancti Spíritus, which was the designated venue for us to play the Series 60 playoffs, they performed another PCR on us and the result was that I was positive for COVID-19. They immediately isolate me, take me to the hospital, until they repeat the test on the fourth day and I come back negative. I didn’t understand anything, really.
“The truth is that a short time later I saw myself outside the management body, but I found out through rumours, through social networks and it was not correct. If they understood that their commitment to me had already been fulfilled and for various reasons they did not want me to continue, the most correct thing was for them to tell me up front, officially.”
With all the experience accumulated during his time as a player and as a coach, Costa does not believe it is correct to compare the baseball played in his years with the current one. “Before the delivery, the love and the identity for the shirt were very different from this time. It was felt, the rivalry was lived in abundance. Industriales, for example, could not conceive of arriving in the capital with two games lost before us and speaking right now of Lázaro de la Torre, remember that year he climbed up to the mound up to four times in a row to throw us and beat us. It was very rare to see a player or a pitcher injured, and yet today is when pitches are most regulated and it is when there are more injuries.
“And the other thing, there is a lot of talk about the unified Cuba to raise the level and others. Look, to raise the level of Cuban baseball, another League is needed. After the National Series, a superior championship in quality like the Selectives, with six, with eight teams. The most logical thing is that if we talk about defending the territory, the shirt, you do it with what you have. And the base is paramount in it. The provinces must have their academy because if not, how do you develop? We must defend the work from the base.
“Granma just won the championship (at the beginning of 2021) with its players, not with reinforcements. The directors are wanting to offer a better show, not to develop the work of the territories. The reinforcements are very good because they improve the end of the Series, but imagine Industriales without qualifying, as it has happened”, analyzed Costa.
What dissatisfactions does Reinaldo Costa keep within himself?
“You will be the only one to hear this confession from my lips. As for the stimulations I have been deceived many times. Since 1999 I have been requesting a car, since a group of retired players have been congratulated on that aspect. And I say that I have been deceived because during all this time they have let me see that I have been planning to receive it and in reality it has been a deception. Every year they tell me the same thing: ‘Make your request, your letter’, and nothing.
“Unfortunately, I got to the stage in which the letters that were granted to acquire vehicles were suspended and then I was left with the hope that because of being sporting glory and because of the results of my career, the opportunity would come.”
Precisely, the family is Reinaldo Costa’s greatest fortune, the one that no one could ever take away from him. He always lived proud of being a good man and thus fulfilling the dream of his parents. To them, he told me, he would not have enough life to thank them for the education they gave him. Unfortunately, he was unable to present them with an Olympic title, but he was very pleased that his parents could enjoy another world champion in the family.
“Another of my joys is having enjoyed the fact that my daughter Maridelsys was, at the time, a member of the national volleyball team, a sport in which Marlenis, my niece, one of the Brunettes of the Caribbean, transcended. The weight may have conspired for my daughter not to be around much longer, but I think it was a factor that could have been worked on with her, not that it was discarded because she had the conditions and the skills.”
How would you like to be remembered?
“I would like to be remembered as a good father, friend, brother, son and husband. That when I pass by a certain place the people who recognize me are for having been a good athlete or for my quality as a human being and can proudly say: ‘There goes Reinaldo Costa’, because I continue to work for baseball, I continue to contribute to the baseball and wherever I am I’m going to die for baseball.”
