Alessandro Maestri (born June 1, 1985 in Cesena, Italy) is an Italian professional baseball player. A pitcher, the 5'11", 180 lb. right-hander signed with the Chicago Cubs as a non-drafted free agent on Jan. 6, 2006, making him the first Italian-born pitcher to be signed by a Major League Baseball team.

Born in Cesena, Maestri grew up in Viserba, a suburb near Rimini. He played in the Italian minor leagues for Torre Pedrera. In 2005 he played with San Marino Baseball in the Italian Baseball League, the highest league in Italy.

Early in the 2007 season, Maestri's second season of professional ball with the Class A Peoria Chiefs, he gave up seven runs in two innings against the Cedar Rapids Kernels. From that point on, he did not give up more than two runs in an appearance for the rest of the season, and converted his first seven save opportunities to earn himself a Midwest League All-Star nod.

His success in 2007 prompted the Cubs to try to convert Maestri into a starter. Thus, he began the 2008 season in the starting rotation of the Florida State League Class A advanced Daytona Cubs. In this role, he went 5-3 with a 3.69 ERA to again earn himself an All Star nod. Following the all star game, Maestri was promoted to the double A Southern League Tennessee Smokies. With the Smokies, Maestri made two starts in which he pitched 11 innings and gave up eight earned runs before shoulder soreness forced the Cubs to shut him down for the remainder of the season, and ended the Cubs' experiment with Maestri as a starter.

...
Wikipedia