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M e x i c o
Saturday,
February 24, 2020
CARIBBEAN
SERIES TO MOVE TO JANUARY?
The president of the Caribbean
Professional Baseball Confederation is floating the idea of moving the
Caribbean Series one week ahead to the end of January and the leader of the
Mexican Pacific League, whose Mazatlan franchise will host the Serie del
Caribe in 2021, is receptive to the idea.
According to the Septima Entrada
website, CBPC head Juan Francisco Puello says that one reason for an earlier
start is so more national winterball champions can take part in the event
"as long as they meet the requirements and that we have the time for
that...time is very important."
Puello also told Septima Entrada that "we have a term
according to the agreement with Major League Baseball, a limited period, so I
have always insisted that this series should start at the end of January and
conclude at the latest, in my opinion, on February 1."
Six nations sent their winter league
champions to San Juan, Puerto Rico earlier this month for the Caribbean Series,
including the Dominican Republic (home of the CS winner Este Toros), Venezuela,
Mexico, Panama, first-timers Colombia and host Puerto Rico. Cuba was scheduled to send their CNS champion
for the seventh consecutive year but backed out a month before the tournament,
stating visa problems. Puello has
disqualified Cuba from sending their pennant-winner to Mazatlan next January
but is said to be interested in bringing new entries, perhaps from Nicaragua,
Curacao or Argentina.
Such a move would almost guarantee
the demise of the Latin American Series, a second-tier competition that was
scheduled for January but cancelled after Panama and Colombia both took part in
the CS instead while the Veracruz Winter League in Mexico went dark, leaving
Nicaragua and Argentina as the sole LAS nations free to participate. Curacao was set to send champions Santa Maria
to the 2019 LAS in Veracruz last winter but pulled out of the tournament,
leading to the host LIV to be represented by two teams, Acayucan and Xalapa.
Puello added that another
consideration in proposing an earlier Caribbean Series is so it won't have to
compete with the NFL's Super Bowl championship game, which also happens in
early February. The CPBC will take up
the matter at their next plenary session, ahead of which, Puello says, "We
are working to see what the leagues think and hopefully, God willing, that can
be confirmed to give a 180-degree turn to the Caribbean Series."
For his part, Mexican Pacific League
president Omar Canizales is open to the idea of his league concluding its
season earlier to accommodate the Caribbean Series in late January. "We have to analyze the schedule we
assembled this last season with ten teams," said Canizales. "This forces us to put together a mirror
calendar so teams can have road trips, home games, weekends...it can be a bit
complicated. However, we are always in
the best position to find formulas that help the Caribbean Series.
"At the same time, we have to
take care of our local championship, without a doubt. Our local championship is very
important."
16
CANDIDATES NAMED ON 2020 SALON DE LA FAMA BALLOT
Former Mexican League slugger and
Florida Marlins Matias Carrillo topped a list of ten new Salon de la Fama
candidates that will join six existing nominees on the ballot to be sent out
voters later this winter. Carrillo
received 53 nominations from the 54 journalists and broadcasters who filled out
their preliminary votes earlier this year.
Ballots were counted by Mexican League president Horacio De La Vega, his
Mexican Pacific League counterpart, Omar Canizales, Salon de la Fama
director Francisco Padilla and Salon historian Horacio Ibarra.
Here's a list of the top ten
vote-getters: Matias Carrillo (53 votes), Isidro Marquez (48), Vinny Castilla
(43), Jose Luis Sandoval (43), Eduardo Jimenez (37), Luis Arredondo (29),
Erubiel Durazo (22), Juan Manuel Palafox (21), Roberto Vizcarra (21) and
Cecilio Ruiz (18).
A native of Los Mochis, Sinaloa,
Carrillo batted .251 over 107 Major League games for Milwaukee and Florida
spread over three seasons between 1991 and 1994 but by far had his greatest
success in the LMB. In 22 Liga seasons, El
Coyote hit .336 with 2,531 hits, including 330 homers, 420 doubles, 1,631
RBIs and 276 stolen bases. He is the
only player in Mexican League history to top the 250 mark in both homers and
steals and has gone on to become a successful, if well-traveled, manager.
Marquez was a top reliever with a
similarly long career, coming out of retirement at age 54 to make six scoreless
appearances with his hometown Navojoa Mayos of the Mexican Pacific League this
winter. He is the Mexican League's
all-time saves leader with 301, nearly 100 more than his nearest competitor,
Sixto Baez (who had 210), and earned saves in all three games of a series three
times for Campeche in 2003.
The ten aforementioned players will
be on the ballot with holdovers Nick Castaneda, Alex Trevino, Antonio Pulido,
Francisco Garcia, Homar Rojas and Pablo Gutierrez, who've all been up for
election in years past. From the ballot of 16 nominees, voters will determine
the next five new members of the Salon de la Fama. Results will be announced in April and
induction ceremonies held n November.
The Salon de la Fama spent
seven years in limbo after the Cuauhtemoc brewery in Monterrey shut down the
building where the museum had been housed in 2012. A new hall of fame in Monterrey was paid for
by Mexico City Diablos Rojos owner Alfredo Harp Helu and formally opened
February 20, 2019. In its first year,
the Salon welcomed nearly 65,000 visitors from 27 countries.
"PANCHO
PONCHES" NAMED NEW CAMPECHE MANAGER
One of the Mexican League's most
venerable and beloved pitchers will remain in Campeche as Francisco
"Pancho Ponches" Campos has been named manager of the Piratas for
2020. A 15-time All-Star who spent
nearly all of his 27-year LMB career pitching in the Walled City, Campos
retired as an active player following the 2019 season. The Guaymas native has served as a bullpen
and pitching coach over the past three winters for the Culiacan Tomateros of
the Mexican Pacific League, but this will be his first manager's job.
Campos made his professional
baseball debut in 1991 with Houston's Gulf Coast League affiliate as a catcher
after wowing scouts at a tryout in Hermosillo.
However, the 18-year-old hit just .147 for an Astros' rookie league
squad that included future MLB star Bobby Abreu, then a 17-year-old
outfielder. Campos also struggled
defensively committing four errors and waving at nine passed balls, although
the strong-armed backstop nailed 15 baserunners over his 21 outings. Campos' switch to the pitcher's mound
following his release proved to be a prescient move.
Originally a Monclova property,
Campos was sent to Campeche in 1993 and, except for stints in the Brewers and
White Sox organizations and a late-season loan in 2006 to Monterrey (where he
went 5-0 for the LMB North champ Sultanes), the man eventually known throughout
Mexico as "Pancho Ponches" remained a Piratas mound mainstay
for 27 seasons. After coming into the
2016 with 192 career wins, Campos struggled for four years to record his 200th
victory, finally doing do last July 2 at home against Union Laguna and
immediately going on the reserve list following what proved to be his last
game. His 2,181 strikeouts place him
fourth on the LMB's all-time list and he holds the record with five ponches
titles. Campos also won the Pitching
Triple Crown in 2004 with a 12-2 record, 99 K's and a 1.47 ERA, becoming the
only hurler since Reynosa's Jim Horsford in 1968 to turn the hat trick. He
tossed a no-hitter against Puebla in 2008, the year before he won his third ERA
title.
Francisco Campos is arguably
Mexican baseball's best pitcher of the 21st century and a sure bet for the Salon
de la Fama, but now he'll take over from Jesus Sommers (a Salon
member himself) to manage a team that finished 47-68 in 2019 and missed the
playoffs for the third straight year. He
becomes the LMB's latest managerial hire after Aguascalientes replaced Felix
Fermin (gone to Durango) with Luis Carlos Rivera, who was canned in Yucatan
last season after a previous stint in Leon.
Campos and Rivera bring the total
number of Mexican-born managers in the LMB to ten (seven in the South Division)
as teams open training camps. Campos is
one of three homegrown skippers making their managerial debuts in 2020, joining
Erick Rodriguez in Oaxaca and Dos Laredo's Pablo Ortega. Rodriguez, who played in his seventh All-Star
Game of the decade last season, will become the LMB's first player/manager
since Saul Soto performed double-duty on an interim basis with Aguascalientes
in 2016. Tim Johnson, who'll make his
Leon debut this spring, is the only extranero helmsman in the LMB South.
The following is a list of current
Mexican League managers (as of February 23) and their countries of origin:
NORTH
DIVISION
Aguascalientes
- Luis Carlos Rivera (Mexico)
Dos Laredos -
Pablo Ortega (Mexico)
Durango -
Felix Fermin (Dominican Republic)
Monclova -
Pat Listach (United States)
Monterrey -
Roberto Kelly (Panama)
Saltillo -
Roberto Vizcarra (Mexico)
Tijuana -
Omar Vizquel (Venezuela)
Union Laguna
- Omar Malave (Venezuela)
SOUTH
DIVISION
Campeche -
Francisco Campos (Mexico)
Leon - Tim
Johnson (United States)
Mexico City -
Sergio Gastelum (Mexico)
Oaxaca -
Erick Rodriguez (Mexico)
Puebla -
Carlos Gastelum (Mexico)
Quintana Roo
- Adan Munoz Mexico)
Tabasco -
Pedro Mere (Mexico)
Yucatan -
Geronimo Gil (Mexico)