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Impending graduation a milestone for Leto High's JoJo Bergollo

 
Bergollo, who has been playing baseball since he was 4 years old — mostly at shortstop — has seen time on the mound after his coach noticed his strong arm.
Bergollo, who has been playing baseball since he was 4 years old — mostly at shortstop — has seen time on the mound after his coach noticed his strong arm.
Published April 18, 2015

TAMPA — The forecast was clear, but J.J. Pizzio still wished for rain. Maybe then, if only for a day, the Leto High School baseball coach could delay the Falcons' regular-season finale against Robinson.

That evening, which promised recognition for his eight graduating seniors, was one he had only dreamed of reaching four years ago. But now?

"I don't know that I'm prepared to tell them goodbye," Pizzio said.

There was a time not so long ago that saying goodbye to senior infielder and right-hander JoJo Bergollo almost had a much different meaning.

The fifth of 13 children, Bergollo has lived much of his life in the background. No one noticed when his grade point average continued to fall or when he stopped going to school altogether. Bergollo was on the brink of failing out and far from being academically eligible to play sports when Pizzio sat him down to lay out the facts.

Pizzio, who has worked at the northwest Hills­borough County school for nine years, is used to coaching kids who don't come from the most stable of homes but said he never has allowed them to use outside challenges as an excuse for failure.

" 'I'll help you only as much as you help yourself,' " Pizzio said he told Bergollo that day.

In the three years since, Bergollo, 18, has improved his grades enough to become eligible to play baseball and basketball. He's also on track to graduate — the first in his family to do so — when Leto holds its ceremony at the Florida State Fairgrounds on June 3.

Bergollo credits Pizzio's tough love and girlfriend Marcella Parrado's support with helping him reach the milestone he once thought was impossible. But always, in the midst of those voices, stood the towering stadium lights of the baseball field, pushing him to make a change.

"If I'm having troubles or I'm having a bad day, as soon as I step on a baseball field, everything goes away," Bergollo said.

• • •

These days, Bergollo's life is pretty regimented.

After attending school, followed by baseball practice or games, he usually heads to a full house, where his father and seven younger brothers and sisters await. Often, he spends the rest of his day helping his siblings with their homework before getting up the next day and doing it all over again.

But there was a time where routine was a foreign concept.

Bergollo was just 6 years old when his parents split up, and he spent much of his childhood going back and forth between his mother and father's houses. While his parents always worked hard to put a roof over his head, Bergollo, who often spent summers at the homes of his youth league coaches, said he didn't always get the attention he craved at home.

As a freshman, Bergollo lived with his mother, Delia Lugo, who spent much of her time in New York caring for her ailing father. With no one around to keep Bergollo on track, he fell off.

By the time he moved back in with his father, Edgar, at the end of the school year, Bergollo had done near-irreparable damage to his GPA, which Pizzio said was about 0.5. Bergollo, who began playing baseball when he was 4 years old for the Town 'N Country Rays, was able to train with the Falcons during the summer and fall. But for the first two regular seasons at Leto, he was ineligible to compete.

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It was during one of those offseason practices his sophomore year, though, that Bergollo looked across to the adjacent softball field and first noticed Parrado, also a pitcher. The two started dating that fall.

During the next two years, Parrado — who hits .443 and has a 5-2 record on the mound for the Falcons this season — kept Bergollo focused. If there was something in school giving him trouble, they would sit down and work on it together. By fall of his junior year, he was eligible to play and wore No. 1 to match Parrado.

"We play sometimes on the same days," Parrado said. "When we're warming up, we'll look across the field at each other, and after the game we'll always talk about if we made errors or how good we did."

Off the field, Parrado has become the voice of confidence that Bergollo often lacked.

"Once we got together, she was like, 'You need to get your stuff together.' She always saw a bright future in me," he said. "Nobody's really told me I can be something, but she always had that confidence that I could be something in life."

Bergollo has put that newfound confidence to good use for Leto. Though he spent most of his life playing shortstop, Pizzio noticed Bergollo's strong arm early and decided to give him a chance on the mound.

"Whenever we're out here goofing around, he's always throwing curveballs to everybody," Pizzio recalled. "I said, 'Well if you're going to be up there screwing around playing catch with curveballs, then I'm going to put you on the mound to throw some of them and see if you can get somebody out.' "

And Bergollo did.

As a junior, he hit .312 and posted a 1.78 ERA in 35.1 innings pitched. This season, he's had similar results, heading into next week's district tournament with a .310 average and 1.47 ERA, striking out 34 in 38 innings.

Bergollo said the proudest moment of his baseball career came March 7, when he pitched a no-hitter in Leto's 8-0 Saladino Tournament win against Wharton. He became just the 15th player in tournament history to throw such a game.

His teammates stormed out of the dugout and tackled him on the mound.

"That's something I've always dreamed about but not something that happens," Bergollo said. "It was one of the greatest moments of my life."

• • •

Bergollo recently received his cap and gown. When he got home from baseball practice, before he did anything else, he showed them off to his family. Bergollo, whose father dropped out in the 11th grade and mother a few months shy of graduation, wants his younger siblings to be motivated by his success.

"They hate homework, but I tell them, 'You need to do it. To be something in life, you need to do homework,' " Bergollo said. "They still hate it, but I'm going to get it through their heads."

Bergollo hopes to go to college and continue playing baseball. One day, he would like to be a police officer or firefighter.

Bergollo's 24-year-old brother, Edgar, is already preparing himself for the emotional day that will be June 3. Edgar, who moved away from home at age 15, always wanted something more for his brother.

"I'll be the first one there to congratulate him and give him a hug and let him know how proud I am of him," he said of the impending graduation. "It will be a very proud moment for everybody in the family."

Bergollo's family members took up a large portion of the bleachers behind home plate on Tuesday, as the Falcons beat Robinson 2-1 in the last game of the regular season. Bergollo went 1-for-3 with a stolen base and a big leaping grab for a third out while his father, two sisters and several nieces and nephews looked on.

Afterward, friends and relatives of the graduating players celebrated on the field for nearly an hour, singing songs and posing for pictures along the third-base line.

As the seniors lined up in front of the Falcons' dugout to receive roses and a trophy, Parrado stood by Bergollo's side, smoothing his hair underneath his red and white Leto ball cap.

Then Pizzio called his name, and across the confetti-strewn field he walked — a mere practice for the biggest walk that's just around the corner.

Kelly Parsons can be reached at kaparsons@tampabay.com. Follow @_kellyparsons.