Article content continued

Alvino may be the most popular and powerful grandmother in baseball. For about two decades, she has filled the bellies of hundreds of players, most of them Latin Americans far from home. Eating her comfort food is a tradition that has become especially popular among players from the family’s homeland, the Dominican Republic.

Photo by Victor Decolongon / Getty Images

A few have come to call Alvino “abuela,” or Grandma, yet most have never met her. She was there for every step in the career of her son Vladimir Guerrero Sr., who was enshrined in the Hall of Fame last year, and now she oversees his son’s.

“I do it out of love,” Alvino said recently as she drank coffee at the dining room table while the food cooked.

Alvino learned to cook in bulk at her mother’s food stand in Don Gregorio, a small town in the baseball-loving Dominican Republic. After some financial trouble in her family, Alvino took over the stand’s cooking duties at age 10.

No country outside the United States has produced more MLB players than the Dominican Republic, and few families have produced more than the Guerreros. Alvino’s four sons — Vladimir Sr., Wilton, Eleazar and Julio Cesar — all became professional baseball players, and several of their children did, too. Vladimir Jr., a rookie, is the only grandchild in the major leagues now.

Although she ended up living with Vladimir Sr. for most of his 16-year career, she first did so with his older brother Wilton, who reached the major leagues as a Los Angeles Dodger just weeks before Vladimir Sr. joined the Montreal Expos in September 1996.