November 22, 2012 (Las Vegas) – He was born in paradise, in a place called Wailuku, on Maui, where pineapples and macadamia nuts grow on trees.

But the ones in the produce section cost money. So Shane Victorino’s parents, Mike and Jocelyn, taught him to work hard. And that regardless of how many sports he played – and Shane played about 38 sports at St. Anthony High in Hawaii – there always was time to do a good deed, such as sweeping the floors at the Catholic church.

So Shane Victorino played all those sports – baseball, football, soccer, track – and he learned to hit a curveball, and he made a vow: that if he ever learned to hit a curveball really well, he’d do stuff for people. Like sweep floors at churches and other stuff.

And then the Phillies took him in the Rule 5 draft – whatever that is – and he broke into the Philadelphia lineup, in 2005.

Usually there was a night game against the Mets, or a day game against the Cubs at Wrigley, and it didn’t leave time for sweeping floors at churches. But he set up a foundation and started doing stuff for a lot of people – but mostly for kids. Such as refurbishing a run-down Boys Club in an old part of North Philly they call Nicetown.

On Monday, Victorino and his wife, Melissa; former Nevada Gov. Bob Miller; and one of the big shots from International Game Technology (Staci Columbo Alonso, and good thing she’s not a ballplayer with a name like that, because she probably would hurt her wrist signing autographs); kicked off a Christmas toy drive at the IGT cafeteria.

Read the full story at LVRJ.com