by KRISTIAN GRAVENOR

When Gatineau native Pierre-Luc "Pete" Laforest, 25, signed with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays in 1997, he agreed to don the tools of ignorance, as Yogi Berra described the catcher's equipment. He then heeded some ill-formed counsel from a senior member of the team's brass. Laforest, at the time a college student in Kansas, was instructed to tell U.S. immigration authorities that he was entering the States to study in Florida, even though his visa was only valid for study in Kansas.

"When the Devil Rays signed me, they told me to pass the U.S. border using my student visa until I had a working visa. So I told U.S. immigration authorities that I was going to school in Florida. They caught me lying and I got banned from the States [following the 1997 season]. I'm stuck with this for the rest of my life," he says.

For the next five years, Laforest got around the restriction by applying annually for a special exemption waiver. "If I don't get that paper I can't get in the States," he says.

Since 1997, Laforest has laboured in Devil Rays' minor-league teams, earning under $10,000 (U.S.) a year while constantly improving his skills. To make ends meet Laforest works in "construction, bars, anything" and lives with his parents during the off-season. But the frugal life was set to change dramatically after he showed some impressive baseball skills. Last autumn, the Devil Rays sent him to the top-prospect Arizona Fall League, an indication that the team considered him a serious candidate for a major league post - a job where salaries start at $300,000 (U.S.) a year.

But while he was readying to fly to Florida for his first-ever major league spring training beginning February 11, Laforest still hadn't received the proper work visa.

"He applied in September and should have gotten the form well before February," says Laforest's Atlanta-based agent Miles Shoda. "But they said that his application had been separated somehow and there's been all these delays."

Seasonal problems

Since September, American bureaucrats have been processing the exemption form attesting that Laforest has no criminal record. "My status hasn't changed, I haven't done anything wrong, it's just that their forms were late and missing. With 9/11 and everything, it's all a big hassle. I usually don't have any problem with it," says Laforest.

His frustrating odyssey continues as he trains indoors daily in west Quebec while the Tampa Bay team is already 15 games into its regular season. The paper stall has not only cost him his crack at the big leagues this season, but also his position with Tampa's AAA Durham affiliate, where the roster has since been filled in his absence. The best he can hope for this season is a spot on the club's AA team.

This isn't the first time Laforest has had difficulties playing the sport he loves. He spent his formative baseball years in St-Eustache and was signed by the Expos in 1995, but after only 18 days, the team released him because he had bulging disks in his back. "But I checked with five other doctors and they said there's nothing wrong," he says.

Laforest's short-lived Expos affiliation cost him the right to play amateur NCAA baseball. He attended community college in Kansas where he was spotted by scouts who had come to scope his hotshot teammate, Longueuil pitching prospect Steve Green.

The Devil Rays, meanwhile, have tried to remedy the situation by lobbying a Florida congressman, a tack that has not resulted in any tangible results. Meanwhile, a marooned, frustrated Laforest has hired a Florida-based immigration lawyer.

"She tells me she's never seen anything like this," he says. "It's a real mess."