Like the great Roberto (Clemente), the Mets star Carlos Delgado is courageous and charitable

	New York Mets' Carlos Delgado. Jim McIsaac/Getty Images

By Karl Taro Greenfeld

How long does it take to drive from Sanjuan to Aguadilla? Ninety minutes? Two hours, tops? Carlos Delgado has driven that route countless times: 22 west to Arecibo and the 2 along the coast, then right on 107, past the Church's Fried Chickens and the Burger Kings and the Taco Makers to the little cul-de-sac with the three-bedroom orange-stucco house in which he grew up, sharing a room with his younger brother, Yasser. On a weekday morning, with no traffic, the car dealer should have gotten to Aguadilla by now. Instead he is telling Delgado -- again -- that he is on the road, but the traffic... Dios mío. That's the same story he told an hour ago. Delgado sighs, hangs up on the cellphone and says out loud, but more to himself, "He's coming, he's coming, he's coming. That's all he says."

This is a special day -- actually, Delgado will tell you that all his days are special, but today is "especially special." He is going to surprise his mother, Carmen, with a new car: a silver Acura SUV with a big red bow on top that she will not be able turn down, because there it will be, on the road in front of her house. Carmen, a former medical technician, won't be able to say, "No, it's too big for me and Papi," as she did last year when Carlos offered her a new mansion a few miles from the modest house where she raised her family.

The dealer, who's driving the vehicle over from San Juan himself, says the roads are jammed, but who knows when he really set out? "I myself am always on time," says the New York Mets first baseman, claiming a trait rare among professional athletes. If he says he will call you at 9 a.m. or pick you up at 9:30, he will. If you miss his call or are late for a meeting, he might not give you another chance. His life seems to be governed by simple rules, and he expects nothing more from those around him than he expects of himself.

Delgado shuts off the cellphone, steps out of his pickup truck and climbs the stairs to the gym to begin his morning workout. The middle-aged women in various shades and styles of spandex in the Body Work fitness center carefully study him as he goes through his routines of pull-downs and chest presses on various machines. They sip from their water bottles and comment to each other on what Carlos is doing today. Tomorrow, Carlos knows, they will be doing their own version of what he is doing now, for they have taken to imitating the fitness routine of Aguadilla's most famous resident, in the belief that what is good for a power-hitting first baseman must also be good for a fortysomething housewife.