Norbert Pickering made pros from Virgin Islands, 16 games

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Norbert Pickering and future major leaguer Midre Cummings worked together to help their native U.S. Virgin Islands to a International Little League game win in Panama in 1986, according to Panama City's La Prensa.

Cummings, who would later see the majors over 11 seasons, hit a home run and knocked in three against Aruba, while Pickering scored a run and may have gotten three hits, based on a La Prensa translation.

While both Cummings and Pickering went on to play in the pros, Pickering's career ended up comparatively shorter. Pickering played in just 16 pro games, all in rookie ball.

Pickering's career began and ended in 1990, signed by the Astros as a free agent out of his native U.S. Virgin Islands.

Pickering started and ended his pro career in the rookie Gulf Coast League. He got into 16 games for the GCL Astros. He hit .383, with nine RBI and four doubles. Those stats mark the extent of his pro career.

Pickering then appears to have returned to the Virgin Islands and played locally. He also appears to have turned youth coach.

A Norbert Pickering is listed as playing in a local baseball league in 2007, as a youth coach in June 2024, and then as a coach for a senior baseball league team in February 2025. 

In 2023, a Norbert Pickering hosted a youth baseball camp that helped select the islands' contingent to the Latin American Baseball Classic in Little League.


1990 Minor League Tally 
Players/Coaches Featured:4,502
Made the Majors:1,431-31.8%
Never Made Majors:3,071-68.2%-X
5+ Seasons in the Majors:581
10+ Seasons in the Minors:357

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