Orlando Cepeda into Baseball Hall of Fame

Subject: Orlando Cepeda
From: cholte1058@aol.com (Christopher H. Holte)
Date: Fri, 06 August 1999 06:26 AM EDT
Message-id: (19990806062654.21497.00003883@ngol04.aol.com)


Buddhism After Baseball

Ex-slugger credits faith with turnaround

BY RICHARD SCHEININ
Mercury News Religion and Ethics Writer
copyright@Mercury News 1999

SUISUN CITY -- When Orlando Cepeda was elected to the Baseball Hall of
Fame last week, San Francisco Giants co-owner Peter Magowan quipped
that Cepeda will be the first Buddhist in Cooperstown.  Cepeda likes
the sound of it: The Baby Bull is a Buddhist.  Sitting in his living
room, the former Giants slugger speculates: Had he been a Buddhist 40
years ago, he would have pushed his lifetime .297 batting average over
.300. Even though fewer than 40 players have hit more home runs than
he, Cepeda would have shoved his total of 379 past 500. That's because
Buddhism would have focused his young mind, he believes, and dodged the
bad karma that plagued him during his 17 years in the major leagues.
``I had a good career but it could have been twice as good,'' he says.
``My mind was very cloudy. I couldn't see myself because my life was so
ugly. But when I began chanting, my life became polished.

``Buddhism saved me.''

Vast spiritual search

In a sense, Cepeda's spiritual search reflects the contemporary,
American religious quest, which extends to the clubhouse. The Giants of
the '80s were famous for their evangelical ``God Squad.'' Islam's
adherents include Tariq Abdul-Wahad of the NBA's Sacramento Kings --
known as Olivier St. Jean when he played for San Jose State. Former
Chicago Bulls Coach Phil Jackson is famous for building team play
through Zen Buddhist principles.

Buddhism brought Cepeda back from the depths. His playing days were
tainted by chronic injuries and disputes with managers; matters got
worse after his 1974 retirement. There was a nine-year free-fall
through financial suffering, marital breakup and a 10-month prison term
for marijuana smuggling in Puerto Rico. Now in his 16th year of
Buddhist practice, Cepeda doesn't proselytize. But when asked about
Buddhism, he talks with animation, and credits his Hall of Fame
election -- after a 20-year wait -- to daily chanting.

He chants, deep and loud: Last week, he and two friends filled Cepeda's
living room with ringing recitations of the Lotus Sutra, an essential
Buddhist teaching about the ultimate perfectibility of human beings.
Cepeda, big as a bull at 61, sat before an oak altar, adorned with
mandala, incense and candles. He progressed quickly through the
Sanskrit, vigorously rubbing prayer beads in the huge hands that once
wielded a weighty 40-ounce bat.

Baseball fans recite, like mantras, the statistics that define its best
performers: For Cepeda, these include nine seasons in which he batted
over .300, seven All-Star appearances and winning the National League
rookie of the year award in 1958. But his selection to the Hall of Fame
is about more than statistics. His Buddhism adds a new dimension to the
Hall, a shrine whose original members were all men of Christian
heritage. ``A Buddhist?'' asks Jeff Idelson, a spokesman for the Hall.
``I don't believe there are any others in the Hall of Fame, but we're
happy to have him.''

Cepeda, born in Ponce, Puerto Rico, in 1937, grew up Catholic, an altar
boy who regularly went to church with his mother, Carmen. But Catholic
faith in the Caribbean often echoes with African spirituality. One
branch of Cepeda's family is famous for maintaining the West African
chants and sacred drum music that were once common throughout Puerto
Rico. When he hit the skids in the '70s, Cepeda was open to a variety
of religious experiences: ``I always knew something was out there
waiting for me,'' he says. ``I tried all the different religions, from
Catholicism to voodoo.''

Return to basics

Cepeda is a member of Soka Gakkai International, a sect based in Japan
that claims 12 million members in 128 countries. It traces its origins
to a 13th-century monk named Nichiren Daishonin, who felt that Buddhism
had become too formalistic, caught up in elaborate ceremonies, and
tried to return it to basics. He taught that the most essential
practice was to chant a single phrase: Nam Myoho Renge Kyo, which
signifies homage to the mystic law of the Lotus Sutra. By diligent
chanting of that mantra, he said, Buddhists could awaken to their
higher selves.

In the last 20 years, the Soka Gakkai sect has been mocked for
promoting a simple, ``Holy Roller'' Buddhism. During the 1970s, it
attracted musicians Tina Turner and Herbie Hancock and was belittled as
celebrity Buddhism. Its practitioners were said to sit in front of
their altars -- chanting Nam Myoho Renge Kyo in a drone -- and
expecting to be rewarded with cars and money.

Cepeda makes no bones that his Buddhism has brought him material
rewards. Without chanting, he says, he and his third wife, Miriam,
wouldn't have a house or a car. He believes that chanting helped turn
the hearts of baseball writers who repeatedly voted against his
induction to Cooperstown in years past.

Cepeda's living room is devoted to Buddhism and baseball. The altar is
flanked by photos of Daisaku Ikeda, president of Soka Gakkai. One wall
is covered with images of Cepeda's boyhood friend Roberto Clemente, the
only other Puerto Rican in the Hall of Fame. After Cepeda finished
chanting the other day, his phone rang repeatedly as friends called to
congratulate him. Neighbors gave him fruit baskets and hugs.

The new Hall of Famer believes that his good fortune is the product of
personal change: ``My victory is the way I've changed inside.'' Soka
Gakkai, which calls itself a ``world peace movement,'' teaches that
chanting brings about internal purification and an outflow of positive
energy to improve society. The chanting Buddhist, pouring this energy
into the world, is said to become a magnet for good fortune.

``Orlando's been to the heights and to the depths,'' says Pat
Gallagher, Giants senior vice president, who has known Cepeda since the
mid-'80s and helped hire him as a community goodwill ambassador. 
Cepeda visits hospitals, homeless centers and youth groups for the
Giants. ``The anger that he once had, he's found a way to deal with it
and make it a positive. To be honest, I'm raised a Catholic and I don't
think I ever knew anybody who was a Buddhist. But I can see it's
provided a vehicle for Orlando to live his life.''

Cepeda got his first taste of Buddhism in 1968 while in Japan on an
exhibition tour. He remembers picking up a book of Buddhist precepts,
and feeling an attraction. In 1970, during spring training, Los Angeles
Dodgers outfielder Willie Davis, a Buddhist, invited Cepeda to a
meeting. But Cepeda -- also nicknamed ``Cha Cha'' from his early days
because he was a dancer and club hopper -- told him, ``No, I've got
things to do tonight. I'm hitting the clubs.''

Caught trafficking marijuana

After his 1974 retirement, Cepeda moved back to Puerto Rico, where his
father, Perucho, had been a legendary home-run hitter and national
hero. Perucho Cepeda, who played professionally in the Caribbean before
the major leagues were integrated, was nicknamed ``The Bull'' and was
known as the Babe Ruth of Puerto Rico. Orlando Cepeda, nicknamed ``The
Baby Bull,'' grew up in his reflected glory.  And in 1975, he dragged
down his father's name; the novice drug trafficker was caught at the
airport in San Juan, Puerto Rico, with a shipment of marijuana.
Convicted of drug possession, he was sent in 1978 to a minimum-security
prison for 10 months. There he joined the jailhouse choir: ``We were
singing, `Praise the Lord!' '' he says.  ``Everybody in jail goes to
Bible study. You get out, forget it.''

It wasn't until 1983 that Cepeda found Buddhism for keeps. Living in
Los Angeles, he ran into an old musician friend who was alarmed by
Cepeda's down-at-the-heels demeanor and invited him to a Soka Gakkai
meeting. Broke and living in a small apartment, Cepeda took one look at
the altar, adorned with a mandala known as the Gohonzon, and ``was
really touched. I used to be tight, defensive, bitter. . . . I used to
blow everybody off: `To hell with the Giants. To hell with the Hall of
Fame.' I remember, way back, a Japanese member of the community saying,
`You talk too much. Misfortune comes from your mouth.' ''

Now Cepeda has returned to his true self: ``Through Buddhism I realize
how much potential I have as a human being, how much I can give back to
humanity with my life. It surprises me that people can change the way
I've changed. I'm surprised every day.''


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Christopher H. Holte