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His dramatic return to his family concluded - after Venezuelan authorities rescued him from his kidnappers at the end of a dramatic gun battle - Nationals catcher Wilson Ramos is still wrapping up his harrowing week before getting things back to normal. A family friend said Ramos has spent the afternoon with the Venezuelan criminal police department (CICPC), debriefing with authorities about yesterday's events and the men who kidnapped him Wednesday.
What follows for Ramos after that will be of a decidedly lighter nature. He'll spend some time recovering from this week's ordeal, when he spent about 51 hours being held for ransom by four Colombian natives who allegedly took him from his family, and then get back to doing what he came to Venezuela to do: playing baseball.
Ramos told reporters he wants to pay at least a few games in the Venezuelan Professional Baseball League this winter, to thank fans and league officials for all their support. Whether he plays down there much after that has yet to be determined, and what he does there in the future also will have to be decided.
The catcher has said he wants to stay in his home country and play, but his abduction was the highest-profile incident in a series of kidnappings involving major league players in the last few years. Diamondbacks catcher Henry Blanco's brother was killed in 2008, and former major leaguer Ugueth Urbina's mother was held for nearly six months in 2004-05.
Ramos will have security personnel stay at his house, according to reports out of the country, but one of his friends who left the country said last night that the 24-year-old catcher should do the same.
Andrea Ramalheira, who grew up in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas and lived in Ramos' hometown of Valencia, came to the U.S. seven years ago and became friends with Ramos this year. At the candlelight vigil for Ramos outside Nationals Park on Friday night, she said she hasn't been back to the country since she left.
"I knew it was going to be bad (with Hugo Chavez as president)," she said. "If I could talk to him, I would tell him to just come here and stay here. He can't stay over there."
That decision will be one Ramos has to make in the future. But for now, he's trying to move on from an episode that will probably shape him forever.
