Rinku Singh, 20, a left-hander, and Dinesh Patel, 19, a right-hander hadn't the slightest clue about how baseball was played when the Pirates signed them. However, in a reality-follows-fiction scenario, they came in first and second respectively in the “Million-Dollar Arm” competition in India by throwing a baseball faster and more accurately than 30,000 other contestants from across the sub-continent.
They are thought to be the first Indian citizens to ever sign a contract with a major US team in any sport.
Mr Singh is the son of a truck driver and the youngest of nine children. Mr Patel was brought up in a village in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh by his uncle and grandmother after his parents found that they could not afford to raise him.
Both are javelin throwers. Patel hit 90 mph on the radar gun during his tryout, Singh topped out at 84 mph.
Not only is the raw talent of these two -- who had never seen a baseball a year ago -- impressive, but there's also the market to think about.
The Pirates’ general manager, Neal Huntington, said: "A billion people are going to take a curiosity in what these two young men do. It sends a message internationally."
In one sense, though, it's too bad these guys didn't sign with Cleveland.
Rinku Singh
