Article: Tre strikes and you're fuori; The language is Italian, but baseball is universal. A young American finds it's a strong connection between boys, dissolving differences.(FEATURES)(LIVING)

Byline: Julia Fein Azoulay Contributor to The Christian Science Monitor

NETTUNO, ITALY -- They're cheering my son; from the dugout they're chanting his name, a Hebrew name they've never encountered before. I've grown accustomed to this; he's a lefty pitcher with a mean natural curve.

In the Irish-Catholic enclave of the Bronx where we lived last year and he won the Little League Cy Young award, no one asked why his name wasn't Sean or Patrick. That's New York.

This year we're living in Florence, Italy, but surprisingly, here, too, we've found baseball - and a powerful common denominator. Indeed, many Italian boys have never met a Jew in their ...

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