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NEW YORK -- Soon, Francisco Lindor and his wife Katia will start the Lindor Foundation, a new initiative that will add to the shortstop’s growing list of charitable works.
Throughout his career, Lindor has already done plenty of good. Since 2020, he has donated more than $1 million to Montverde Academy, his high school in Florida. That money has gone mostly to Lindor Hall, a two-story middle school building featuring state-of-the-art science and technology labs. He also established the Francisco Lindor Scholarship Fund to help students who otherwise wouldn’t have the financial means to attend Montverde.
Additional philanthropic endeavors for Lindor have included hurricane relief efforts in his native Puerto Rico, as well as health and wellness initiatives, environmental initiatives and meet-and-greets with students.
For those reasons and others, the Mets on Monday named Lindor their nominee for the Roberto Clemente Award -- Major League Baseball’s highest off-field honor -- for the third year in a row. MLB will announce the league-wide winner during the World Series.
“That means I’m making my dad proud,” Lindor said of his nomination. “That means I’m helping others. I’m representing Puerto Rico, my family and the Clemente family the right way. So I’m happy to get another chance of winning it.”
Regardless of whether Lindor wins the award this year, he intends to step up his charitable game through the Lindor Foundation, which will launch in the near future. Lindor’s wife, Katia, will run the foundation with the intention of providing scholarship money for students to attend college. In a nod to Katia’s background as a violinist, the Lindors will focus their efforts on those looking to pursue the fine arts.
“There’s a lot of things for athletes, but not everyone gets to be a professional athlete,” Lindor said. “My hope and my goal is to give people stuff that I wasn’t able to get. I didn’t get the education in college, so maybe I can help others get educated.
“It will be special, because whenever you can have a foundation, it means you have the resources to help others. I’m blessed to have a lot more than what I deserve. So I think it would be part of the legacy. I think my daughters and my boy are going to grow up, and hopefully … they want to [help]. They’re going to have something to look up to. So I’m excited for it.”
As a native Puerto Rican, Lindor has often spoken of the Clemente Award as a long-term career goal, understanding how much Roberto Clemente meant to his homeland. Lindor’s foundation should take him one step closer to realizing that vision, regardless of whether it happens this year or later in his career.
“It would be a dream,” Lindor said. “It would be something that probably I would give the trophy to my dad and say, ‘This is you. You instilled this in me and were the one that made me be the one I am today when it comes to that.’ It would be special for sure. It would be something that I would cherish for the rest of my life.”