The devastating toll of Venezuela's twin earthquakes has reached one of the country's most cherished institutions: youth baseball.
The president of Criollitos de La Guaira, part of Criollitos de Venezuela, the country's largest youth baseball organization, says at least 100 children enrolled in the league were killed when the powerful magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 earthquakes struck the country's central coast last week, leaving entire communities in ruins.
"It is a tragedy and such an enormous pain that there will never be a remedy for it," Jhorny Sojo, president of Criollitos de La Guaira, told the independent Venezuelan news outlet El Pitazo through tears.
According to Sojo, the number continues to rise as families search for missing children and authorities identify victims.
"We don't have the real numbers yet. There are about 100 baseball players confirmed dead from reports submitted by the different teams, and many more remain missing. Many are also hospitalized in medical centers in Caracas," he said.
Criollitos de Venezuela is one of the country's premier youth baseball organizations, with half a million kids annually participating in its leagues (approximately 1,200 children and teenagers from its La Guaira programs). The league has long served as a pipeline for Venezuelan baseball talent while, both inside and outside the country, also functioning as a community hub for thousands of families.
Sojo said the tragedy has been especially heartbreaking because many of the victims were among the organization's youngest members.
"What we regret the most is that the majority of the children who died belonged to the 'Semilleros' category, children four and five years old. It has been something terrible," he said.
The baseball executive is also among the earthquake survivors.
He lived with his family on the 11th floor of the El Mástil apartment building in Playa Grande, one of the areas hardest hit by the earthquakes. He said they managed to escape moments before widespread destruction unfolded around them.
"I don't want to go back to Playa Grande," Sojo said before clarifying, "At least not now."
"We got out. I don't know how long it took us, but when we reached the street, what we saw in Playa Grande looked like a world war. It was total devastation," he recalled.
Despite losing friends, neighbors and dozens of young athletes, Sojo says he has spent the days since the disaster coordinating aid for surviving players and their families.
Working alongside Criollitos officials in Caracas, the organization is gathering food, clothing, medical supplies and financial donations for children hospitalized after the disaster, displaced families and those who lost everything when homes collapsed.
"We're receiving donations from every corner of Criollitos de Venezuela, from the Venezuelan Baseball Federation and from Little League organizations," Sojo said. "Right now, we are all one baseball family."
The organization says many surviving families remain without basic necessities, including food, clothing and shoes, after entire neighborhoods were destroyed.
"We hope to return with food and clothing because people were left with nothing," Sojo said.
The loss has reverberated throughout Venezuela's baseball community, where generations of professional players have begun their careers in youth leagues like Criollitos. While rescue crews continue searching through collapsed buildings in La Guaira, Caracas and surrounding areas, the tragedy has transformed what was once a place of dreams for aspiring athletes into one of the country's most heartbreaking symbols of the earthquake's human cost.
Criollitos de Venezuela has launched a fundraising campaign to help cover medical expenses and emergency assistance for surviving players and their families as the organization begins the difficult task of mourning the children whose lives ended long before their baseball dreams had a chance to unfold.
