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- Blake Shane Gailen (בלייק גיילין; born March 27, 1985) is an American-Israeli hitting coach for the Arizona Complex League Dodgers and left-handed former professional baseball outfielder. He also plays for the Israel National Baseball Team. In high school, Gailen was first-team All-West Valley League in California in his junior and senior seasons. He played baseball for Glendale Community College, where he was All-Western State Conference as a freshman and All-Southern California Team as a sophomore. He played summer ball, and was a Coastal Plain League All Star during the 2005 and 2006 seasons. In 2011 Gailen won the American Association batting title with a .406 batting average, a new league record. In 2012, he was named the Atlantic League Most Valuable Player as well as Baseball America's Independent League Player of the Year, and starting All Star in left field, after batting .338 (winning his second consecutive league batting title) with 22 home runs, 89 RBIs, and 25 stolen bases. In 2014, he was named to the Atlantic League's All-Star team. He played in AA for the Toronto Blue Jays organization in 2011 and 2015, and in AAA for the Los Angeles Angels organization in 2013. Through 2018, Gailen had played 1,226 games over 12 seasons, and batted .306 with 167 home runs in aggregate. Gailen played for Team Israel at the 2017 World Baseball Classic in 2017, and in the Confederation of European Baseball 2019 European Baseball Championship - B-Pool in 2019, where he was named the MVP. He signed a minor league contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2017. After finishing the season with the Tulsa Drillers, Gailen was brought back for spring training. He did not make the team out of spring training and played the season out with the Lancaster Barnstormers. In 2018, he became a dual Israeli citizen. Gailen again signed a minor league contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers in January 2019. Out of spring training, he was assigned to the Triple-A Oklahoma City Dodgers. He played for Team Israel at the 2019 European Baseball Championship. He also played for the team at the Africa/Europe 2020 Olympic Qualification tournament in Italy in 2019, which Israel won to qualify to play baseball at the 2020 Summer Olympics. In October 2020, Gailen signed a contract with the Melbourne Aces of the Australian Baseball League. He played center field for Team Israel at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo in the summer of 2021. (en)
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