Kieran Powell, a 25-year-old West Indies cricketer, has worked out before a host of Major League Baseball scouts in hopes of switching sport.
In 2012 Powell, a left-handed opener, became the first West Indies player to hit two centuries in a Test since Brian Lara, scoring 117 & 110 against Bangladesh.
But after being replaced in a players dispute with the West Indies Cricket Board, Powell took his talents from the Caribbean to Florida and began training for a career in the American pastime, a longshot given he was starting two decades after many of the sport’s stars began playing the game.
Powell conducted workouts last week for the New York Mets and Milwaukee Brewers and 12 major league teams scouted him Wednesday at IMG Academy in Bradenton, including the New York Yankees, San Francisco Giants, Tampa Bay Rays and Chicago Cubs.
“We decided to take this adventure and it has worked out well so far,” Powell told Major League Baseball’s website. “The right opportunity at the right time.”
Following a path familiar to Caribbean youth in Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic where the game is a passion, Powell simply has to adjust to balls being thrown in the air in front of him between the knees and chest rather than bounced balls with a wicket to protect.
“I know (baseball) pretty well,” he said. “All you’ve got to do is hit the ball in the gap and get on base.”
It’s trickier than it sounds. Balls hit too far to the side or behind are out of play. And you must run if the ball is in fair territory, whether you find a gap or not. And speed and swing angle adjustments from cricket style to baseball are major and vital.
Powell ignored American football, saying, “I would get beaten up very badly and I don’t like getting tackled.”
So he has worked with major league players, including Miami Marlins second baseman Dee Gordon, and there has been interest from some clubs, although Powell might need more developmental-league work before taking a swing at the major league level.
“Nobody expects to just walk in and be the star of the show from day one,” Powell said. “I just want an opportunity. I know that once I get an opportunity, I’ll make gold of it.”

Key figure in steroids scandal gets short sentence
Anthony Bosch, whose Florida clinic was at the heart of a Major League Baseball doping scandal that led to a lengthy ban for star Alex Rodriguez, had his prison sentence reduced Thursday.
The four-year sentence imposed on Biogenesis founder Bosch was trimmed by 16 months to two years and eight months by US District Judge Darrin Gayles, granting a request by prosecutors because of cooperation by Bosch.
Bosch revealed major evidence against four others in the Biogenesis scandal, linking records and e-mails to subjects in a case that produced eight convictions. Bosch, 52, pleaded guilty of conspiracy to distribute testosterone in 2014.
Evidence showed Bosch took money to provide steroids to such baseball stars as Milwaukee’s Ryan Braun and New York Yankees standout Rodriguez, leading to 14 suspensions but no criminal charges.
Rodriguez was banned for the entire 2014 campaign, the toughest suspension of all and in part because he took steps to impede a Major League Baseball investigation into the Biogenesis scandal. “A-Rod” returned to the Yankees in 2015 and advanced to fourth on the all-time major league home run list with 678. The 40-year-old slugger, who helped the Yankees win a World Series crown in 2009, hit 33 homers last season.
He is 27 behind Babe Ruth’s Yankee record 714 homers and 75 shy of Barry Bonds’ record of 762, a controversial mark due to Bonds’ links to the BALCO steroid scandal although he was never suspended for doping, perjury charges for denying he was a dope cheat were dropped and an obstruction of justice conviction was overturned last year.

Court fines pitchers for overseas gambling
South Korean pitchers Oh Seung-hwan and Lim Chang-yong were each fined 10 million won ($8,270) yesterday for violating the country’s gambling laws.
Seoul Central District Court imposed the fines after the players were charged with gambling tens of thousands of dollars in Macau in November 2014, local media said. South Korea’s gambling laws ban nationals from betting in casinos abroad. Prosecutors had initially asked for fines of 7 million won to be imposed but the court decided to hand out the maximum penalty available under the law.