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B a s e b a l l
M e x i c o
Monday,
November 23, 2020
LMP
RESUMES GAMES; GUASAVE PLAYER HITS 3 HOMERS IN GAME
After a self-imposed shutdown of
eleven days due to increasing cases of the Wuhan virus among players
and
coaches, the Mexican Pacific League swung back into action last Tuesday
night
with four games. A fifth scheduled contest, in which Los Mochis was to
play in
Guasave, was moved to Monday, November 23 in Los Mochis due to
logistical
issues, according to an Algodoneros press release.
The extra day off didn't do anything
to throw off Guasave outfielder Leo German's timing. The 5'9” veteran
had never
hit more than three home runs in a season (summer or winter) until he
launched
10 longballs for Dos Laredos in a 2019 Mexican League campaign that saw
numbers
inflated by a very lively Franklin ball that was discarded after one
year. Even
so, it was the 27-year-old German who became the 39th player in Mex Pac
history
to hit three homers in a nine-inning game, two of them “panoramic”
blasts,
according to Puro Beisbol editor Fernando Ballesteros, in
Guasave's 5-3
win over the Caneros.
A three-run homer by Felix Perez
keyed a four-run top of the seventh inning that lifted Obregon into a
9-8
comeback win at Mexicali Saturday night, completing a Yaquis
doubleheader sweep
of the Aguilas that helped keep the visitors in first place, although
Sunday's
closing game was forfeited to Mexicali, 9-0, by the LMP office after
three
Yaquis tested positive for the Wuhan virus. The forfeit drops Obregon's
record
to 19-7, two games ahead of Hermosillo in second at 15-7.
Monterrey (12-10) first baseman
Dustin Peterson had a night to remember in Thursday's 11-4 win in
Navojoa.
During a ten-run outburst in the top of the seventh in which 13
Sultanes went
to the plate, Peterson socked a solo homer off Marco Carrillo and a
two-run
roundtripper off Francisco Moreno to become only the third batter in
LMP
history to hit two homers in the same frame. The first was Hermosillo's
Altar
Greene against Navojoa in 1979 while Roberto Saucedo of Mazatlan did
the double
in 2001, also against the Mayos. Older brother D.J. Peterson, playing
the
initial hassock for Navojoa, had earlier launched a longball in the
bottom of
the third inning as the Petersons set a league record with three homers
while playing
for opposite teams.
It was a tough week for the Mayos,
who are 9-16 and a half-game ahead of 8-16 basement-dwelling Los
Mochis.
Navojoa lost 20-year-old Padres outfield prospect Tirso Ornelas for the
season
with a serious arm injury. Ornelas, one of four players sent by Obregon
in
exchange for first baseman Victor Mendoza early this month, was batting
.286
with a double and two runs scored in five games for his new team.
Although the trade looked like a
potential bonanza for Navojoa at the time, it's not working out that
way.
Besides Ornelas' injury, then-league ERA leader Octavio Acosta was
unenthusiatic about the move and in his first start against Monterrey,
Acosta
was shelled for five runs on six hits in 1.2 innings. Likewise,
Francisco Moreno
(already pitching for his third team this winter) has been hit hard in
two
outings and, like Acosta, has a 27.00 ERA for the Mayos while second
baseman
Moises Gutierrez is batting just .214 after for games with Navojoa. If
there's
any consolation for the Mayos, Mendoza is rehabbing a leg injury and
has yet to
play for the Yaquis.
It was also a tough week for veteran
manager Juan Jose Pacho, who was fired by Mazatlan Thursday after the
Venados
ended a three-game series in Culiacan with an 8-14 record. Even a 9-7
victory
over the Tomateros in the finale wasn't enough to save Pacho, who led
Mazatlan
to three LMP pennants and a pair of Caribbean Series wins in two
previous terms
at the helm of the team, from being the second manager canned this
season
(Mexicali parted ways with Pedro Mere after an 0-8 start and has since
gone
11-6 under Bronswell Patrick).
Pacho has been replaced by pitching
coach Pablo Ortega, a longtime star hurler in both Mexican leagues
(including a
76-71 record and 3.27 ERA over 18 LMP seasons, 15 with Mazatlan) who
had been
named manager of Dos Laredos for 2020 but never managed a game for the
Tecolotes after the Mexican League canceled the season. He won his
managerial
debut at home Friday night as the Deer topped Los Mochis, 7-4, and
followed
that up with a 6-5 Saturday win as Isaac Paredes scored from second in
the
bottom of the ninth when a Carlos Munoz grounder that Caneros second
baseman
Esteban Quiroz had to dive to stop drew an errant Quiroz throw to the
plate
that brought in Paredes with the winning run.
MEXICAN
PACIFIC LEAGUE STANDINGS (as of 11/22/20)
Obregon
19-6, Hermosillo 15-7, Culiacan 14-12, Monterrey 12-10, Guasave 11-12,
Jalisco
11-14, Mexicali 11-14, Mazatlan 10-14, Navojoa 10-16, Los Mochis 8-16.
JALISCO
TO JOIN VERACRUZ AS LMB EXPANSION TEAMS?
The Mexican League's announcement
that an acceptable proposal from Veracruz for an expansion team has
been
received (and that the port city will likely be given a franchise in
the near
future) created speculation as to who would be the second new club. It
now
appears that the Jalisco Charros may become the 18th LMB team, joining
the
Monterrey Sultanes in operating ballclubs in both the LMB and Mexican
Pacific
League.
Guadalajara is Mexico's
second-largest city and while previous attempts by operators of Mexican
League
teams have ended in failure, baseball's profile in a metropolis where
soccer is
king has risen considerably over the past several years, beginning with
the
purchase and shifting of the Mexican Pacific League's team in Guasave
in 2014
couple with the renamed Jalisco Charros buying Guadalajara's existing
Estadio
Panamericano ballpark (built for the 2011 Pan-American Games) and
renovating
it. Since then, the Charros have become one of the best-drawing clubs
in the
Mex Pac during their six years of existence and won their first LMP
championship and Caribbean Series berth last winter.
On a broader scale, Charros
co-owners Armando Navarro and Salvador Quirarte have been very
proactive in
bringing outside baseball events into renamed Estadio Charros, which
can now
seat up to 16,000 spectators, including the World Baseball Classic,
Premier12
and Caribbean Series. Now it looks as though Guadalajara is poised to
host
professional baseball on a year-round basis.
However, it appears that they may be
be doing it without Quirarte in the fold. Jose Carlos Campos, a former
LMP
media relations director who now oversee the El Rincon Beisbolero
website, says
that Quirarte is coming up short in an internal struggle within the
front
office and “was forced by the members to leave the office (and club)
for
reasons of lack of clarity regarding the basketball club that he also
managed.”
Campos speculates that the two new
LMB teams would not be the product of expansion to 18 teams, but rather
a
“recomposition” involving two current Liga members, adding that
“growing in
numbers in times of severe crisis is not exactly a good idea.” There
had been
rumors that the Aguascalientes Rieleros would be sold and moved to
Veracruz in
2021, but the LMB office quashed them.
A familiar name is apparently
heading the effort to bring a Mexican League team back to Veracruz.
According
to Jose Antonio Otero of El Fildeo, local businessman Bernardo Pasquel
is son
of former Veracruz Azules co-owner Bernardo Senior and nephew of former
LMB
president Jorge Pasquel, whose strong will and deep pockets turned the
circuit
into a threat to Major League Baseball's hegemony over the game in the
1940's.
After bringing a number of top Negro League players to Mexico, the
elder
Pasquel turned his attention and resources to MLB players. Stan Musial
and Ted
Williams both turned down his offers, but he was able to get Vern
Stephens, Max
Lanier, Sal Maglie and Danny Gardella to agree to play south of the
border,
resulting in baseball commissioner Happy Chandler slapping a lifetime
ban on
players who stayed in Mexico (it was later reduced to a five-year ban
after
Gardella's antitrust lawsuit was allowed by a federal appeals court to
move
forward). The Pasquels eventually left the game in 1952 and Jorge died
in a
plane crash three years later.
AMEZCUA,
MAZON ELECTED TO CARIBBEAN SERIES HALL OF FAME
Longtime Culiacan catcher Adan
Amezcua and Hermosillo Naranjeros team president Enrique Mazon have
been
selected as new members of the Caribbean Series Hall of Fame. The two
are
scheduled to be be inducted during a ceremony held at the 2021 Serie
del Caribe
in Mazatlan.
Amezcua, who played 21 consecutive
seasons with the Tomateros in the Mexican Pacific League, was named the
Most
Valuable Player in the 2002 CS in Caracas after batting .455 with three
homers
as Culiacan became the first team in Mexico to win two championships in
that
event. The man nicknamed “El General” had already been a champion with
the
Tomateros in Santo Domingo in 1996 and later obtained a third in
Mazatlan 2005
as a reinforcement for the Venados in their first Caribbean Series
crown,
earning kudos for his work with a pitching staff that included
Francisco
Campos, Pablo Ortega and Jorge Campillo.
Now 46, the 6'3” 200-pounder had an
LMP career batting average of .267 with 68 homers and 299 RBIs in 794
games
when he retired in 2014. After spending time playing in the Astros,
Orioles and
Padres systems between 1993 and 2002, Amezcua played the final 13
summers of
his pro career in the Mexican League and played on pennant winners with
Monterrey in 2007 and Quintana Roo in 2013 and 2015. He had unofficial
LMB
career totals of 60 homers and 409 RBIs to augment a .293 average in
872
contests.
Amezcua, who is an analyst on a
podcast for Puro Beisbol, will have a special motivation
because the
tribute will be in his hometown of Mazatlan. He'll be adding another
achievement to his brilliant career after the Tomateros retired his
number 31
in December 2017.
Mazon has been with the Hermosillo
organization since 1987 and a fundamental piece in the Naranjeros' past
success
as part of eight of the sixteen titles that the Hermosillo team has won
in the
Mex Pac: 1989-1990, 1991-1992, 1993-1994, 1994-1995, 2000-2001,
2006-2007,
2009-2010 and 2013-2014. Under Mazon, the Orangemen also were champions
in the
2014 Caribbean Series in Margarita, Venezuela while organizing the
Caribbean
classic's 1987, 1992, 1997 and 2013 in Hermosillo.
Mazon also helped oversee the
construction of Estadio Sonora, a 16,000-seat ballpark that opened in
February
2013 to replace Estadio Hector Espino (the Naranjeros' longtime home)
and is
considered by many to be the nicest baseball facility in Mexico.
Hermosillo
annually ranks among the LMP's attendance leaders with well over 10,000
seats
filled nighty. Last winter, the team finished second in the loop with
an
average of 14,324 per opening in the regular season.
This winter, he's celebrating 33 years as the
Naranjeros team president.
