College essays that made a difference - Princeton Review 2010
David Gibbs
The applicants
David served as captain of his high school basketball and baseball teams.
Stats
SAT: 2060 (610 Critical Reading, 760 Math, 690 Writing)
High School GPA: Did not have a GPA
High School: Riverdale Country School, Bronx, NY
Hometown: Harrison, NY
Gender: Male
Race: Caucasian
Applied To
Tufts University (applied early decision)
Tulane University (applied early decision)
Essay
David submitted the following essay to the schools listed above.
Topic of your choice.
Danny Almonte and Me
Tuesday, July 27th, 2001. We’ve had a great run up to this point. Because we lost the second game of the district tournament, we had to win seven in a row in order to win the championship. Now, after winning our first two games of the Section tournament, we are in the finals. A win today would put us in the State tournament with a chance to go to the Regionals.
I step off the bus and see players from the other team, Rolando Paulino, getting out of their cars in the parking lot. These kids are humongous. They’re twelve?
“Danny, me da algunas semillas girasoles,” one of them says. I don’t understand Spanish. If they speak Spanish during the game, we’ll have no chance of figuring out their strategies.
“Play ball!” says the umpire as Rolando Paulino takes the field. We’re at bat, and before I know it we already have runners on second and third. How did that happen? Rolando Paulino is supposed to be amazing. Maybe we do have a chance to — but there’s our third out.
I take the mound for the bottom of the first. Curve ball, high. Bad decision. OK, here is a fastball. Wow, he hit that a long way. I guess this team really is as good as it looks.
Here’s their Number Three batter, a tall, skinny kid with some facial hair, the one everyone has been talking about. Danny Almonte. I tell myself to relax, but I don’t take my own advice: I throw a fastball down the middle. Danny wastes no time in crushing it to the fence. Suddenly, I’m pretty sure I know how this game is going to play out.
The rest is a complete blur. All I remember is Rolando Paulino hitting a lot of balls hard and me doing a lot of second guessing.
Afterwards, even though I am upset that this great run we’ve had is over, I accept that Paulino is better than us. Now it is time to concentrate on winning our league championship.
That night at dinner my dad and I discuss the game. He brings up some points that hadn’t occurred to me: that Danny Almonte threw the ball nearly 80mph, at least 8 mph faster than any other Little League pitcher; that kids who have facial hair are probably fourteen and fifteen; that the thirteen members of Rolando Paulino attended eight different schools — a difficult feat considering that all the players must live in the same neighborhood. “David,” he says, “there’s a strong possibility that this team was cheating.”
Almonte’s team forfeits LLWS victories
Sports Illustrated: Friday August 31, 2001
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic (AP)-Little League pitcher Danny Almonte is no longer perfect—because he’s no longer 12.
The boy who dominated the Little League World Series with his 70mph fastballs was ruled ineligible Friday after government records experts determined he actually is 14, and that birth certificates showing he was two years younger were false
There it was in black and white. Danny Almonte ruined my chance of playing in the Little League World Series.
It’s now five years later, and the name Danny Almonte still upsets me. It has taken me that long to articulate the effect this episode has had on me, both as an athlete and as a person. Under the influence of a crooked coach, Danny’s team ruined the integrity of Little League Baseball. They weren’t able to distinguish right and wrong. They lacked the discipline to resist temptation. Every time a person or a team taints a sport, the accomplishments of honest athletes go unnoticed. Competition itself depends on the honesty of the players: cheaters not only ruin the significance of victory and defeat for everyone else, but also undermines the sport they claim to love. Because I have seen cheating up close and have been directly affected by it, I can’t take cheating lightly in any realm of life, whether it be sports, school, or business. I would never want to make someone feel the way I felt after I found out that all my hard work — my dream — was ruined by cheaters.
Today, Danny Almonte and I still aspire to play baseball at the highest levels. He appears on television and in the newspaper occasionally, and he is a more talented ballplayer than I am, but I would never want to trade places with him. I’d rather be an honest loser than a dishonest winner.
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