BBM TO RETURN FOR MEXICAN LEAGUE PLAYOFFS

HOLA! I hope everyone is having a good, safe summer. Things are going fine here in the Philippines, although we're on the cusp of monsoon season (which means the bailing buckets are getting cleaned up).

Originally, I'd planned to wait until October to resume posting on Baseball Mexico, writing about the Canadian Football League and/or Pecos League (the Wild West of indyball) to stay fresh as a writer. Instead, when the CFL and Pecos seasons started in May, I decided that I'd rather keep recharging my batteries while maintaining my focus on Mexican baseball, which is where my niche seems to be anyway. What was it Clint Eastwood used to say about knowing your limitations?

Anyway, I've decided that I'll fire BBM back up in about a month so I can cover the Mexican League playoffs, which begin the second week of August. Six months off is long enough and, with 12 teams qualifying for the LMB postseason this year, all nine teams in the North are still in contention for a playoff berth and even though it would take a miracle for Leon to come back from 11.5 games out of sixth in the South, both Campeche and Oaxaca have a Hail Mary's chance with 24 games left in the regular season...why not come back a little early?

Quick takes: Saltillo's Rainel Rosario is battling for the Triple Crown, leading the LMB with a .378 average and 86 RBIs while tied with Tijuana's Nick Williams at the top with 29 homers...A 5'7" pitcher for Tabasco, Yoennis Yera, is having a great first season in Mexico (hard to call a 32-year-old with 14 years' experience in the Cuban National Series a "rookie"). Yera is the only qualifying pitcher in the LMB with a sub-3.00 ERA (2.94) his six wins are tied for third in the loop...the Olmecas are 2.5 games behind first-place Puebla in the LMB South under Pedro Mere, who I'll go ahead and call the best manager in Mexico (if you can win in Villahermosa, you can win anywhere), but only 5.5 games separate the top six teams...Tijuana and Dos Laredos are in a dogfight for first in the LMB North, where the real battle will be for among four teams for the sixth and final playoff slot.

Ahhh, the juices are starting to flow already. See you again on August 8.

Bruce

SUBSCRIBE TO FREE BASEBALL MEXICO EMAILS

     Baseball Mexico is returning to its roots in 2021. 

     Back when BBM debuted in 2005 under the name Pelotero, we offered readers free direct email subscriptions in which they received newsletters for every column concerning Mexican baseball the day it posted on the internet. It was quite popular 16 years ago, so why not do it again?

     This time, if you contact us at BaseballMexico@live.com and let us know you'd like BBM sent to your inbox, you'll get a free newsletter every Monday BEFORE the text is posted on this blog. We'll be notifying past subscribers to ask if they'd like to be added to the new mailing list but if you're one of those folks, it makes sense to remove all doubt and sign up as though you're a newbie.

     On a related note, BBM will cease posting notifications with headlines of our weekly posts on Facebook and Twitter. Neither platform has led to an increase of traffic on the BBM site and that's the reason for posting on those sites. Facebook in particular has restricted our posts from news feeds without answering repeated requests for an explanation as to why.  

     There WILL be a BBM group on MeWe in the near future because readers won't be censored, assaulted by advertising or tracked by that platform while being able to interact with each other. More on that when it happens.

     Anyway, be sure to sign up for our FREE email newsletter by emailing us at BaseballMexico@live.com. We'll put you on the mailing list and you'll start getting your weekly update on Mexican baseball next Monday.

     As always, thanks for reading. We definitely don't do this for the money (if anything, Baseball America still owes us $75 for a past entry to one of their Almanacs), it's for the love of both baseball and Mexico. It's amazing that Baseball Mexico is still the only English-language source of news on baseball south of the border, but that only adds importance to the need for accuracy in what you read here. You'll still get an occasional opinion tossed in, but this has always primarily been a news site and that role is taken seriously.

Yours in Beisbol,
Bruce Baskin

BBM EXTRA: Marking 15 year of covering Mexican baseball

Hard to believe, but it's been over 15 years since I started writing about professional baseball in Mexico. Back in 2005, I was "between jobs" as a radio announcer and wanting to do a little creative writing about sports while looking for a new gig. I wanted to write about something different, even exotic, and something that didn't get a lot of exposure in America's sports media.

After contacting Paul Reeths, who runs the outstanding OurSportsCentral.com website dedicated to minor league sports, we kicked around the idea. I'd covered the Pacific Coast League for OSC in 2001, so Paul and I already knew each other. After discussing whether I should write about cricket (no pro league in the USA) or Japanese baseball (not an American league), we settled on the Mexican League, which snuck in on the basis of being a AAA member of Minor League Baseball, albeit outside the USA. The Mexican League was about to start so I banged out a season preview, titled it Pelotero (which simply means "Ballplayer") and sent it to Paul, who posted it on March 18, 2005. Here's a link to an archived version of that first edition of Pelotero. Later that year, Craig Tomarkin of BaseballGuru.com picked up the column (by then called Viva Beisbol) and, like Paul, is still posting my ramblings in 2020. I greataly appreciate both of them for giving me a platform before I even thought of starting a blog.

Fifteen years later, here we are. What began as something to do for one Mexican League season has now outlasted my radio career by eight years, which says something. There've been a couple of name changes (first to Viva Beisbol less than a month after Pelotero debuted and then to Baseball Mexico in 2009) and interruptions along the way, while the frequency of posts has changed until I settled on this three-stories-per-Monday format a couple years ago. Monday has always been a travel day in Mexican baseball and it's been a traditional posting day for Pelotero/VB/BBM since the beginning. It seems to work. By the way, about that BBM acronym: I wanted a short name for Baseball Mexico but BM seemed a little too scatalogical so I decided on BBM (for BaseBall Mexico, a quasi 19th century touch) as a compromise.

Mucho kudos to Suzann Lankford, a graphic artist I met when she played baseball in Seattle, for designing the Baseball Mexico logo. I wanted to base it on the Mexican flag with the eagle holding a baseball bat instead of a snake and Suzann did a great job making sure there's no doubt that BBM is about baseball in Mexico. Special thanks are also due to a couple more people: Carlos Fragoso of Mexico City was the original "Latin Insider" on BaseballGuru.com and was hugely helpful in the earliest days of Viva Beisbol at a time when information on Mexican baseball was hard to find on the internet; Tanya Sullivan of California was extremely supportive of my efforts and sent me step-by-step instructions on how to build a blog, specifically the one you're now reading.

Rontrez Johnson, first player mentioned in Pelotero

I got into this because of my love of writing, my love of baseball and my love of Mexico and that all remains and while it would be nice to get some money for the 4-6 hours it takes to put one of these columns together every week, it's not the point. At one time, Viva Beisbol could be read via seven websites on both sides of the border and was even included on the Mexican Pacific League's website for a while (many thanks to former LMP public relations director Jose Carlos Campos for that). 

I always try to get my stories right and it drives me crazy when I don't because this is the only English-language coverage these players get and they deserve accuracy, not always easily determined when I'm not able to read Spanish beyond a few words and have to use Google translations, which often need translating themselves. I HAVE always tried to be honest and while my opinions sometimes leak through, the most important thing to me is getting the whole story out there and sometimes that means digging a little deeper than my Mexican sources go. It occasionally makes for a longer read (and definitely more time to write), but I think the extra work has been worth it.

Anyway, all this is a long way of getting around to saying "Thank you" personally for reading this blog, especially the few who've been reading these stories since the earliest days...the only person I know for sure who fits that category is a man (and now a friend) named Jim McCurdy, who I also call El Profe, a former semipro ballplayer who spent a lot of time playing in Mexico before becoming a college instructor near the Texas border. There may be others but no matter how long you've been reading this, I've always been glad you were there, especially the many people in Mexico who've "Liked" the BBM Facebook page, which is little more than a tease to this one. The vast majority of FB Likers have been from south of the border and it's an honor to have people with several other very good Mexican websites written en espanol to choose from (they're in the right margin), yet you come here too. BBM passed 700,000 all-time pageviews earlier this month, but so many of those have been bots from places like Russia, France and more recently that baseball hotbed of Turkmenistan, you can take that number with the entire box of salt, let alone a grain of it. 

I plan to continue writing about Mexican baseball because even though the teams and leagues I cover studiously ignore BBM, this isn't for them. It's always been about the men who have played in Mexico and always will be. Like it or not, you're stuck with me.

But, damn, I'd really like to go back to that Pelotero name. It just SOUNDS cool.

Bruce

Mexican Baseball Road Trip: Tucson, Arizona

Well, today is the day I hop on a plane in Portland, Oregon and travel to Tucson, Arizona for this week's seventh edition of the Mexican Baseball Fiesta, in which four Mexican Pacific league teams plus a squad of Cincinnati Reds minor leaguers will play four doubleheaders in as many days at Kino Veterans Memorial Stadium.  It's been quite a few years since BBM's last virtual Mexican Baseball Road Trip through all 24 MexPac and Mexican League cities (October 2009 through March 2010, to be exact...they're all archived on this site), but since Tucson constitutes a REAL road trip, it seems appropriate to add the Old Pueblo to the list, making it the first city in the USA profiled here.

Tucson, Arizona can be reached from Mexico by crossing the border at the Sonora city of Nogales, which has thousands of residents in both countries, and driving 60 miles north on Interstate 19 past the towns of Tubac and Green Valley along the way.  For what it's worth, I-19 is the only interstate highway in the USA marked by kilometer posts instead of mileposts.  Tucson itself sits on an alluvial plain in the Sonoran Desert and is surrounded by five minor mountain ranges.  The dry, hot climate brings the city an average of 11.56 inches of rain per year with daytime high temperatures ranging from the mid-60's in December and January to the high-90's and low-100's in June and July.  Low temperatures during winter are typically around 40 degrees while summertime lows rarely dip below 70.

What is now Tucson was first occupied by paleo-Indians as early as 12,000 B.C. and an archeological dig that turned up a village dating from 2,100 B.C.  Indigenous people later farmed the area near the Santa Cruz River for centuries, building extensive irrigation canal systems for corn and bean crops.  Ceramic pottery was developed between 600 and 1450 A.D. for cooking and storage.  Jesuit missionary Eusebio Francisco Kino first visited the area in 1692 and later oversaw the construction of Mission Xavier del Bac in 1700.  Hugh O'Conor, an Irish-born officer in the Spanish Army, is considered the founder of Tucson after establishing a military fort there in 1775.  The Spaniards faced a number of attacks from Apaches over time until Mexico was granted independence from Spain in 1821, at which time Tucson (the name was gradually adopted over time) became a Sonoran city.  Tucson was a way station on an important route to California during the 1849 Gold Rush.

What is now the state of Arizona was acquired by the USA as part of its 1854 Gadsden Purchase treaty with Mexico and Tucson continued as a stage station into the early 1860's, when it actually became the western capital of the Confederate Arizona Territory between 1861 and 1862 during the Civil War until the rebels were driven out by the California Column.  Tucson later served as capital of the USA's Arizona Territory between 1867 and 1877, becoming the first Arizona city to incorporate during the latter year.  The University of Arizona was founded there in 1885 and by 1900, Tucson had a population of 7,531.  The city gradually grew over the decades (although there was a boom from a population of 45,454 in 1950 to 212,892 in 1960) and is now home to an estimated 530,706 residents, 41.6 percent of whom are of Hispanic heritage.  Tucson's growth has been outward more than upward, with relatively few high-rise buildings in comparison with other cities of similar size.

Tucson has become a tech hub over recent years, earning the nickname of the "Optics Valley."  Several major corporations have a presence in the city, including Raytheon, Texas Instruments, IBM, Intuit and Honeywell.  The University of Arizona, which now has over 43,000 students, has become a driving cultural and economic force in Tucson, and holds the nation's fourth-largest book festival with 450 authors and 80,000 attendees.  The Tucson Gem & Mineral Show is the largest such event in the United States while the Tucson Folk Festival, Fourth Avenue Street Fair, Tucson Rodeo and All SOuls Procession Weekend have also become popular events.

Baseball has had a long, if somewhat spotty, presence in Tucson.  The Old Pueblos team played in the Class D Rio Grande Association in 1915, building a 19-40 record until the league folded in July of that year.  While semipro and amateur baseball kept the sport going for years afterward, minor league baseball didn't return until 1928, when the Tucson Cowboys finished last in the Class D Arizona State League.  This started an on-again, off-again pattern of teams in Tucson, with the Depression shutting down the Arizona-Texas League for four years in the 1930's and World War II shutting the A-TL down for another five seasons in the early 1940's.  It was during this time that a 9,500-seat ballpark now known as Hi Corbett Field was erected in 1937.  Tucson won the league's pennant under Cowboys manager Pat Patterson in 1941, the last year the loop operated before going dark during wartime.  From 1947 until 1958, Tucson continued to field teams at the Class C and D levels in regional leagues, winning the Arizona-Texas League title in 1953 by 13 games with Don Jameson as skipper.

After the A-TL folded following the 1958 as part of the decline of minor league ball during that era, there was no pro ball in Tucson until 1969, although the city had been a spring training site for the Cleveland Indians since 1947, when Bill Veeck (who owned a ranch in the area) brought his newly-acquired team to Hi Corbett Field from Florida, reportedly to avoid the latter's Jim Crow laws of the time.  Indians players often rode horses on Veeck's property after games.   Still, it took the ascension of San Diego and Seattle to the major leagues for the Pacific Coast League to place a franchise in Tucson. The Toros (so designated in a "Name the Team" contest by future Pima County sheriff Clarence Dupnik) represented Tucson through the 1997 season, winning PCL titles in 1991 and 1993 as affiliates of the Houston Astros.  The team name was changed to Sidewinders between 1998 and 2008, winning a third PCL pennant for Tucson in 1996 as the Arizona Diamondbacks' AAA affiliate.  However, 2008 proved to be the final year for the Sidewinders in the PCL before the franchise moved to Reno the following year.  Another Toros team popped up in 2009 and spent two years in the independent Golden Baseball League before the PCL returned in 2011 when the Portland Beavers spent three seasons there as the renamed Tucson Padres before that franchise moved to El Paso in 2014.  The city has not had an affiliated minor league team since, although the Tucson Saguaros have spent the last two summers playing in the independent Pecos League, winning the 2016 pennant and finishing with the loop's best record in 2017 before losing to High Desert in the playoffs.

By then, Tucson's teams had moved from Hi Corbett Field to 8,000-seat Kino Veterans Memorial Stadium, which was completed in 1998 and originally known as Tucson Electric Park, to accommodate the MLB Diamondbacks and Chicago White Sox for spring training while the Colorado Rockies (who'd made Tucson their spring home in 1993 after the Indians left for Florida that year) continued using Hi Corbett Field four miles to the north, although all three organizations have since relocated to spring facilities in the Phoenix area.  The Chisox moved out after 2008 and both the Rockies and D-Backs pulled out after their 2010 camp had concluded.

Kino Stadium has a grass berm rimming the outfield that can hold another 3,000 to allow a total of 11,500 people (including standees) for ballgames.  The ballpark, which will host the Mexican Baseball Fiesta this week for the seventh year in a row, is symmetrical with distances of 340 feet to each foul line and 405 feet to straightaway center field.  Owned by Pima County, Kino Stadium was built for $38 million.   The facility has also been used as a training camp for the New York Red Bulls of Major League Soccer and matches in the annual Desert Diamond Cup, which is now a six-team MLS preseason tournament won last February by the Houston Dynamo.

Mexican Baseball Fiesta returns to Tucson; BBM will be there

The Mexican Baseball Fiesta, featuring four Mexican Pacific League teams and a team of MLB prospects, will be back for a seventh year in a row from late September through early October.  The MBF's centerpiece is a four-day stretch of doubleheaders at Kino Veterans Memorial Stadium in Tucson, Arizona from October 4-8, with other games taking place in several other Arizona cities like Mesa, Douglas, Nogales and San Luis as well as Cashman Field in Las Vegas.

Former Tucson Toros and Padres general manager Mike Feder, who was the Pacific Coast League's Executive of the Year in both 1991 and 2013, is heading the effort in the Old Pueblo.  "We believe it was essential that we continue this fun-filled, cross-border and cultural event in Tucson," says Feder.  "This tournament includes some of the most popular teams in Mexico."  This year, the Hermosillo Naranjeros, Obregon Yaquis, Mexicali Aguilas and Los Mochis Caneros from the LMP will be joined in Tucson by a team of Cincinnati Reds minor leaguers.  The MBF serves a dual purpose of providing MexPac teams a chance to play exhibition games in preparation for next month's season openers while exposing fans north of the border to baseball Mexican-style.  In addition to the game on the field, there will be live music and other elements to bring a little salsa to the ballpark.

Originally known as Tucson Electric Park, Kino Stadium was completed in 1998 with 8,000 permanent seats plus room for 3,500 more on the outfield berm.  It has served as home to not only Tucson's PCL teams but also as a spring training site for the Arizona Diamondbacks and Chicago White Sox before both teams joined the Colorado Rockies (who'd used crosstown Hi Corbett Field) in leaving Tucson for the Phoenix area.  Since the Padres departed town for El Paso in 2014 after three seasons, the city of a million metropolitan residents has not had its own PCL minor league baseball team, although the Tucson Saguaros of the independent Pecos League completed their second season at Kino Stadium from May to August this year.

Baseball Mexico (i.e., me) will be on hand in Tucson next month to file daily reports on all eight games played there, marking the first time BBM has ever covered Mexican baseball in person since the old Viva Beisbol column began in 2005, although audio from one of the old BBM programs on Florida shortwave radio station WRMI in late 2009 originated from Estadio Teodoro Mariscal in Mazatlan.  Options are being explored for broadcasting at least one MBF game live from Tucson on shortwave or the internet.

MEXICAN BASEBALL FIESTA: Tucson schedule
THU, Oct. 5   Obregon vs. Mexicali, Hermosillo vs. Cincinnati (1st game at 5:30pm MT)
FRI, Oct. 6    Mexicali vs. Cincinnati, Hermosillo vs. Obregon (1st game at 5:30pm MT)
SAT, Oct. 7   Los Mochis vs. Mexicali, Obregon vs. Hermosillo (1st game at 5:30pm MT)
SUN, Oct. 8  Mexicali vs. Obregon, Hermosillo vs. Los Mochis (1st game at 3:00pm MT)

Other MBF Dates and Venues
FRI, Sept. 22  Hermosillo vs. Obregon at Las Vegas, NV (7:05pm PT)
SAT, Sept. 23  Obregon vs. Hermosillo at Las Vegas, NV (7:05pm PT)
SAT, Sept. 30  Mexicali vs. Hermosillo at San Luis, AZ (7:00pm MT)
SUN, Oct. 1    Hermosillo vs. Mexicali, Mexicali vs. Los Mochis at Mesa AZ (1st game at 3:00pm MT)
WED, Oct. 4   Obregon vs. Hermosillo at Nogales, AZ (7:30pm MT)
THU, Oct. 5    Hermosillo vs. Los Mochis (7:30pm) at Douglas, AZ (7:30pm MT)

1,000th BBM post coming Monday: A look back

Sometimes stream-of-consciousness writing goes sideways, especially when you go into it without an exit strategy.  That’s what happened when I first wrote this story on Friday and ended up with over 1,500 words.  Too much, so I’m rewriting the piece using the self-imposed, 800-word limit Rick Reilly employed writing for Sports Illustrated and ESPN.  What better example than (IMHO) the best American sports columnist of our generation?

This was just going to be a “between-jobs” creative outlet in 2005, something exotic (to me) to write about for the OurSports Central site while looking for radio work.  Instead, in 2017, I’m five years removed from my last radio gig while after a pair of time-outs (one for 3+ years), I’m committed to Baseball Mexico for the long haul.  While composing a column sitting next to my mother in a hospital bed the night she died, I knew that writing about Mexican baseball was something I wasn’t going to let go of even as I was struggling with having to let Mom go, a struggle that continues.  My mistake in 2012 when we thought we were going to lose Mom was dropping Baseball America instead of seeing it as the oasis it is.

Monday will mark Baseball Mexico’s thousandth post since 2009, when it was revived and renamed from Viva Beisbol (itself renamed from Pelotero after two or three weeks in 2005...Pelotero is still my favorite name but least-understood by Anglos like me).  It’s all been quite a ride, with lots of excitement interspersed with disappointment along the way.  Even though there’ve been decisions that haven’t worked out and I’ve made less than $1,000 total over twelve years, I don’t regret the decision to cover baseball south of the border in the first place, even though it wasn’t my first choice at the time.

I’d written for OSC before, including covering the Pacific Coast League’s 2001 season, but wanted to write about something different in 2005 after losing a radio job in Washington state.  After first floating the idea of covering cricket and then pitching Japanese baseball (both were turned down by OSC editor/webmaster Paul Reeths in Wisconsin), we settled on the Mexican League because it is an official Class AAA baseball circuit.  I figured the LMB season would run into August, by which time I should have a new radio job to concentrate on.  I did land a radio job, but I also discovered something about Mexican baseball: I was fascinated by it and didn’t want to stop writing about it.

If you’ve read BBM for any real length of time, you know that baseball in Mexico is not the same as baseball in the United States.  Even though the Mexican League is indeed a AAA league, there is no other loop in Minor League Baseball with the Liga’s autonomy.  It’s a different world down there, sort of like the minors were before Branch Rickey invented the farm system.  The results are often confounding but rarely boring, and the fact baseball is played year-round between the LMB and the Mexican Pacific League (which has become a juggernaut in recent winters) means there’s almost always a game going on.  Mexico is Baseball Heaven.

As mentioned, there’ve been disappointments over the years, but two individuals have done more than anyone to keep my flame burning when it’s flickered.  Jim McCurdy is a retired college professor in Texas who played semipro ball in Mexico and has always been a source of encouragement.  Everyone needs an El Profe in their life and I’ve been blessed to have Jim in mine since VB's earliest days.  Then there’s Carlos Fragoso in Mexico City.  

Sometimes I think Carlos knows everyone in Mexican baseball and maybe he really does.  When Craig Tomarkin added Viva Beisbol to his Baseball Guru website, Carlos was the Guru’s “Latin Insider” who reported on Mexican baseball.  Far from being resentful of a gringo invading his territory, Carlos was supportive from the start and his personal kindness over the years would take up an entire column.  I can’t describe how much these two guys have meant to both me and VB/BBM...it’s very possible I wouldn’t be here without them.

By the way, Carlos is running for president of the Olmeca Little League in Mexico City, the largest LL in Mexico.  The election is Sunday and while I try to keep BBM as politics-free as possible (don’t we sometimes turn on a ballgame for three hours WITHOUT politics?), I will wholeheartedly endorse Carlos Fragoso for that job.  So does Tomas “Tommy al Bat” Morales, who’s still writing about baseball after more than 65 years and is a national treasure as well as a full member of the Mexican Baseball Hall of Fame.  If Carlos is good enough for Tommy…

Finally, thanks to you for reading BBM.  I hope that my love for writing, baseball and Mexico shows through.  We should always follow our passions, and I get to follow three. Even though this has been an awful year personally, I’m so lucky that I can do this and that someone like you actually reads it.  Monday may be BBM’s thousandth post, but it’ll be far from the last.

Mexican League split: Is a "two-state solution" best?

The ongoing battle among Mexican League owners over the number of Mexican-American players, considered "domestic" (and thus protecting them from the six-man limit on foreigners) by LMB policy, took another twist Wednesday when league president Plinio Escalante walked out of a Board of Governors meeting and told the media he'd resigned. Some sources back up Escalante's version, but others say he was more or less invited to leave.  Escalante did tell gathered media at the Mexico City meeting that he'd be consulting his attorney over compensation for the remainder of his contract, not the usual action of someone who left his job voluntarily.  Whatever led to his exit, the Mexican League now effectively has no sitting president.

The Yucatan native had been president of the Liga since 2007 and previously planned to step down at the end of the 2016 season, perhaps to return to the Yucatan Leones front office in his hometown of Merida.  Instead, league owners convinced Escalante to agree to a two-year contract extension last winter (only Quintana Roo voted against the offer), presumably with an accompanying salary increase.  He may now be regretting not sticking to his initial decision. Escalante couldn't bring together the two warring factions of owners, one advocating the continuation of a limit of nine Mexican-Americans per team while the others wanted no limit on Mexican-American players, claiming they can't afford to develop their own domestic talent.  The rift has grown into a full-blown schism that threatens to either split into two separate eight-team leagues or even end with a total shutdown for the 2017 season and beyond until the issue is finally resolved, something nowhere near happening at present.

A summer without baseball?  I think of baseball fans across Mexico facing that prospect.  A stevedore in Veracruz...an artisan in Oaxaca...a schoolkid in Monterrey...  What happens to them?  And how about homegrown thirtysomething veterans like Carlos Valencia, Mauricio Lara or Cesar Tapia; players too old to be considered MLB prospects but good enough to be productive in the top level of baseball at home? How will they make a living from March until Mexican Pacific League training camps open in September?  Clearly, shutting down is the worst possible scenario; both sides will have lost the first major battle in their not-always-civil war.  Thus the other option, a "two-state solution" of sorts in which the LMB splits into two divisions (or even leagues) with schedules independent of each other, becomes worthy of a long look.

As I write this, the Mexican League is a sometimes-unwieldy league with 16 teams stretching from Tijuana to Cancun.  According to Puro Beisbol editor and columnist Fernando Ballasteros (perhaps Mexican baseball's best cronista today), the coalition of owners wanting no limit on Mexican-Americans is led by Tijuana's Alberto Uribe, Puebla Pericos owner Gerardo Benavides (the LMB's 2016 Executive of the Year) and brothers Juan Jose and Erick Arellano, who own both the Yucatan Leones and now the Laguna Vaqueros.  They're joined by Monclova, Veracruz, Aguascalientes and maybe Leon to represent a so-called "new breed" of owner butting heads with the establishment.  The more entrenched likes of Quintana Roo owner Carlos Peralta, Monterrey's Jose Maiz and Alfredo Harp Helu, owner in both Mexico City and Oaxaca, are joined by their counterparts in Saltillo, Campeche, Tabasco and maybe Durango who prefer less reliance on players from outside Mexico.  That appears to be a clean enough split for two separate LMB divisions playing their own internal schedule (and wouldn't a Mexico Series in September between the two champions be interesting?), but things rarely get settled easily in the Mexican League and this would be no exception, based on those aforementioned "maybes," Leon and Durango.

Both came into existence last November after the Reynosa Broncos and Carmen Delfines, respectively, morphed into the Leon Bravos and Durango Generales for 2017.  Both are also on very shaky ground due to ballparks that have fallen into disrepair with no work being done and the clock ticking as the April openers (if there ARE openers) approach.  Bravos owner Mauricio Martinez, who moved the Broncos to Leon with Liga approval, was strangely not allowed to represent his franchise at Tuesday's meeting, giving the upper hand in votes to the Old Guard.  Villareal is said to already want out of Leon and its substandard 3,000-seat ballpark, moving the franchise instead to Nuevo Laredo, where a 12,000-seater built in 2007 as part of a sports complex outside the border city limits, a point of contention among local fans.

Things aren't much better in Durango, where Estadio Francisco Villa (yes, a ballpark is named after Pancho Villa, a Durango native who was a hero of the Mexican Revolution) does hold 8,000 fans but also needs upgradeing. LMB Operations Manager Nestor Alva Brito and Umpire Supervisor Luis Alberto Ramirez toured the park last month and said it would need extensions to both dugouts and dressing rooms for players and umpires, bathroom upgrades, new mesh screens around home plate, parking for team buses and improved lighting.  Rumors have included both teams dropping out this year and the 14 remaining franchises moving forward, which could create a scheduling nightmare if a split resulted in two seven-team loops.  That all of this is happening on the heels of a 2016 season that saw declining attendance figures in many Liga cities last season does not help solve that problem either.

Both factions have merit to their arguments.  The free-market guy in me agrees that sports teams owe it to themselves and their fan base to bring in the best players they can find and put them on the field.  It's called "competition" and that's not a bad thing.  In any business, not just sports, owners who don't continually seek to improve their product risk being passed by competitors. On the other hand, even though BBM might gain a few clicks with stories on exploits south of the border of former big leaguers like Yuniesky Betancourt, Kyle Farnsworth, Ruben Rivera and Travis Blackley, I ultimately want to see overall improvement among Mexican players as a result of experience gained playing in both the LMB and LMP, and they can't gain that experience if more players from outside the country take up roster spots.  I'm very happy that Mexico has risen to sixth in the world in the latest WBSC rankings and would love to see even better things but to achieve that, Mexican players gotta play.

If the Mexican League schism can't be resolved (and without a leader, resolution becomes more difficult), I'd rather see a fractured two-league setup than no baseball at all.  Baseball has survived far worse because the game is bigger than any owner, but I think about players like Carlos Valencia and Mauricio Lara, guys I've written about for years who might lose their livelihoods if the LMB goes dark, and I also think about fans of all ages in places like Monterrey, Veracruz and Oaxaca.  As a gringo observer on the outside looking in, I don't deserve better from the Mexican League, but those players and fans sure do.

Opinions expressed above do, in fact, reflect those of staff and management at Baseball Mexico because I AM the staff and management of Baseball Mexico...it keeps the payroll down.

List of past and present BBM Award winners

MOST VALUABLE PLAYER
Summer 2010 - Willis Otanez, 1B, Puebla Pericos
Winter 2011 - Justin Christian, OF, Los Mochis Caneros
Summer 2011 - Luis Terrero, OF, Mexico City Diablos
Winter 2016 - Christian Villanueva, 3B, Obregon Yaquis
Summer 2016 - Cesar Tapia, C, Puebla Pericos

PLAYOFF MVP
Winter 2011 - Iker Franco, C, Obregon Yaquis
Summer 2011 - Pablo Ortega, P, Quintana Roo Tigres
Winter 2016 - Hector Daniel Hernandez, P, Mexicali Aguilas
Summer 2016 - Mauricio Lara, P, Puebla Pericos

BATTER OF THE YEAR
Winter 2016 - Jose Amador, 1B, Hermosillo Naranjeros
Summer 2016 - Diory Hernandez, Aguascalientes Rieleros

PITCHER OF THE YEAR
Summer 2010 - Bobby Cramer, Quintana Roo Tigres
Winter 2011 - Jose Silva, Culiacan Tomateros
Summer 2011 - Francisco Campos, Campeche Pirates
Winter 2016 - Javier Solano, Mexicali Aguilas
Summer 2016 - Yoanner Negrin, Yucatan Leones

MANAGER OF THE YEAR
Summer 2010 - Eddie Diaz, Oaxaca Warriors
Winter 2011 - Matias Carrillo, Guasave Algodoneros
Summer 2011 - Daniel Fernandez, Mexico City Diablos Rojos
Winter 2016 - Edgar Gonzalez, Mexicali Aguilas
Summer 2016 - Willie Romero, Yucatan Leones

NEWCOMER OF THE YEAR
Summer 2010 - Sandy Madera, 1B, Yucatan Leones
Winter 2011 - Barbaro Canizares, 1B, Obregon Yaquis
Summer 2011 - Doug Clark, OF, Quintana Roo Tigres

List of past and present BBM Award winners

MOST VALUABLE PLAYER
Summer 2010 - Willis Otanez, 1B, Puebla Pericos
Winter 2011 - Justin Christian, OF, Los Mochis Caneros
Summer 2011 - Luis Terrero, OF, Mexico City Diablos
Winter 2016 - Christian Villanueva, 3B, Obregon Yaquis

PLAYOFF MVP
Winter 2011 - Iker Franco, C, Obregon Yaquis
Summer 2011 - Pablo Ortega, P, Quintana Roo Tigres
Winter 2016 - Hector Daniel Hernandez, P, Mexicali Aguilas

BATTER OF THE YEAR
Winter 2016 - Jose Amador, Hermosillo Naranjeros

PITCHER OF THE YEAR
Summer 2010 - Bobby Cramer, Quintana Roo Tigres
Winter 2011 - Jose Silva, Culiacan Tomateros
Summer 2011 - Francisco Campos, Campeche Piratas
Winter 2016 - Javier Solano, Mexicali Aguilas

MANAGER OF THE YEAR
Summer 2010 - Eddie Diaz, Oaxaca Guerreros
Winter 2011 - Matias Carrillo, Guasave Algodoneros
Summer 2011 - Daniel Fernandez, Mexico City Diablos Rojos
Winter 2016 - Edgar Gonzalez, Mexicali Aguilas

NEWCOMER OF THE YEAR
Summer 2010 - Sandy Madera, 1B, Yucatan Leones
Winter 2011 - Barbaro Canizares, 1B, Obregon Yaquis
Summer 2011 - Doug Clark, OF, Quintana Roo Tigres

TOMMY AL BAT on Jorge Pasquel's Last Game

Tomas "Tommy" Morales is a baseball treasure.
Since making his 1956 writing debut for Hit magazine, the 83-year-old Morales is in his seventh decade covering the game in Mexico and North America via his "Tommy al Bat" column. Writers and announcers are given full membership in Mexican baseball's Hall of Fame and Morales was enshrined in 1990.

The Barcelona-born scribe may draw comparisons to the late Washington Post columnist Shirley Povich for their longevity, but where Povich produced one column per week as an octogenarian, Morales still puts out several columns a week.  Also, Povich was a local icon in the D.C. area but Tommy is cherished by Mexicans from Baja California to the Yucatan Peninsula. Perhaps the better comparison would be with Vin Scully, who transcends his Dodgers affiliation.

What follows is a translation of Morales' February 24th "Tommy al Bat" column describing the final game as an owner and baseball power broker for the legendary Jorge Pasquel, a 1951 contest Morales himself attended as a 19-year-old law student in Mexico City.  Apologies in advance if this translation doesn't hit every right note.  Something is always lost when removed from its original language and not being remotely fluent in Spanish presents an extra challenge for me, but I want BBM readers to get at least a taste of one of Mexican baseball's living legends writing now about what became an important event in Mexico's baseball timeline that he witnessed 65 years ago:

On October 8, 1951, exactly the same day as the Giants beat the Yankees, 5-1, in the first game of the World Series that year, Mexico City’s Delta Park that night featured a game that was historically very important, since not only was it the end of the Veracruz Azules but the famous magnate Jorge Pasquel, too.

The Mexican League then stretched their calendar until the Major League World Series.  It was the fifth game of the final series for the crown between the visiting San Luis Potosi Tuneros and the Veracruz Blues. These Azules dominated the series for title success, three games to one.  For this meeting the Tuneros, handled by "Chile" Gomez, opened with southpaw Wenceslao Gonzalez, who would have his chance to pitch in the Major Leagues with the Washington Senators in 1955, while the Azules opened with black American Rufus Lewis.

Jorge Pasquel was in his box next to the dugout of his Azules on the third base side for this game, which could be the coronation.  That year I was studying my senior year of law school at Colegio Cristobal Colon and went with a classmate to see the game.  I remember near the beginning of the game, when we arrived at Delta Park, there was lightning in the distant sky but it never rained. I went to my favorite place, the Shaded General section, on the third base side running into left. There were not many people in the park since the finals had broken down after a big fight that took place in San Luis Potosi and why it was decided that the rest of the series would be played at Delta Park.

In the second inning, the Blues scored the first run of the game when "Kanguro" Jimenez scored after "Bibi" Crespo and pitcher Rufus Lewis both singled. Wenceslao avoided further damage by dominating Felipe Iturralde into a double play groundout.

In the beginning of the fourth, however, the Tuneros scored twice to take the lead, all coming with two outs: Cuban veteran Carlos Blanco, always a good hitter, got a hit, advanced to second on a passed ball and scored on a single by gradulón Rene Gonzalez.  Singles by catcher Raul Navarro and Claudio Solano pushed across the second run.  For the sixth inning, Rufus Lewis exited as Pasquel called on Ramón Bragaña to relief.  It was a great twist of fate, as the "Professor" was going to win the last game in the history of the Veracruz Azules after 12 years of life as a star pitcher with the Blue team.

It was not until the eighth that the Azules managed the tying second run, an unearned one.  Panamanian Leon Kellman was awarded first base and Angel Castro hit a grounder that looked like a double play, but second baseman Beto Rodriguez made a bad play at short to leave two on with no outs. The bases were filled with a walk to "Kanguro" Jimenez and the tying run came in on a slow grounder produced by "Bibi" Crespo.

After Bragaña put up a zero in the top of the ninth, the Azules came to bat in the bottom of the ninth, starting with a Felipe Iturralde walk, but Wenceslao Gonzalez dominated Chema Castro for a strikeout and a high fly by Leon Kellman that looked like an out was not caught by Fernando Garcia, resulting in a double that left runners on second and third with one out, the runner on third representing the possible championship run for the Blues.  "Chile" Gomez ordered Angel Castro intentionally walked to load the bases loaded and sent to bat the stocky, but strong, Panamanian Archie Brathwaite, a candidate for a double-play grounder savior if he hit one.

But the Panamanian, on a count of a ball and a strike, hit a high fly to short right. Iturralde, a fast player, took off from from third on the hit and came home and beat the throw from outfielder Alfonso Zarate, giving the Azules their crown. Pasquel was already on the ground when the winning run scored and shared hugs and congratulations with his players. As I was watching the celebration,the lights were suddenly turned off at Delta and we were in the dark, a darkness that marked the disappearance of Veracruz Blues and retirement of the famous Jorge Pasquel, who four years later in 1955 died in an accident piloting his own plane.

The Veracruz Azules of 1951, the last Azules, were a different team than what Pasquel had when they commenced in 1940 with players like the great Josh Gibson.  They were both champions, the first and the last. The years have passed rapidly, as usual, and that darkness that came at the end of the coronation game also marked the end of a very important in our beloved Mexican League era.  We all got to ask a few days later: Could the  Mexican League survive without Jorge Pasquel?

Tommy Morales' "Tommy al Bat" blog is available en espanol on the Mexican League website.

MexPac to use 22 days announcing awards; Bammys coming next week

The Mexican Pacific League has begun announcing postseason honors for their 2015-16 season, with three outfielders given Golden Gloves awards Tuesday.

The naming of Navojoa left fielder Quincy Latimore, Mexicali center fielder Chris Roberson and Hermosillo right fielder Sebastian Elizalde as the MexPac's best-fielding outfielders kicked off what will be a 22-day stretch in which the league releases the names of its top performers in dribs and drabs, culminating with the Tuesday, March 15 announcement of the LMP's Matias Carrillo Trophy for best batter, Ronnie Camacho Trophy for top slugger and the Playoff MVP, three weeks after the first winners were announced.  The Hector Espino MVP Trophy will be mentioned on March 11.

Conversely, our own BBM Winter Awards, lovingly known as the "Bammys" (hey, if ESPN can lay on the cheese...) will require only next week to announce.  Admittedly, there won't be as many awards as the LMP does, for which we proudly hide behind the old saw that "brevity is the soul of wit."  When in doubt, quote Shakespeare.

Anyway, here's a look at next week's BBM Winter Awards schedule:

MONDAY - Manager of the Year
TUESDAY - Batter of the Year
WEDNESDAY - Pitcher of the Year
THURSDAY - Most Valuable Player
FRIDAY - Playoff MVP

BBM ON HIATUS UNTIL LMP PLAYOFFS; FREE SEASON GUIDE AVAILABLE

Because of scheduling conflicts and needed prioritizations elsewhere (sorry to be so cryptic), Baseball Mexico will be taking the Mexican Pacific League's regular season off with plans to be back in time for the January playoffs and the Caribbean Series in February. There's no crisis or anything like that...I just don't have the time right now to do justice to this blog or newsletter. I AM happy to send a full color PDF file of the 30-page BBM 2011-12 Mex Pac Guide for free to anyone who wants a copy. It has Opening Day rosters, stadium photos, team directories, highlights and stats from last season along with profiles of each LMP city.

There are three websites you can access daily to keep up with the Mex Pac in BBM's absence: One is the MLB Caribbean Leagues page, which posts results daily and offers timely stats and standings of all four CS leagues. Second, there's Puro Beisbol, which may be the best baseball site in Mexico and a longtime source of story material for both BBM and the earlier Viva Beisbol site/newsletter. The third is the Mexican Pacific League website itself, for obvious reasons. The Puro Beisbol and Mex Pac links are to English translations...Puro Beisbol can be tricky to work with, but worth the effort.

If all goes according to plan, I should have BBM back and running at the end of December when the playoffs are just about to get underway. Again, my apologies for what will end up being about a 10-week hiatus, but sometimes even a favorite hobby like this has to take a backseat and this is one of those times. Thanks for understanding.

BASEBALL MEXICO’S 2011 Mexican League All-Star Team

1B-Barbaro Canizares, Oaxaca (.396/20/76): Led the Liga in batting, hit .526 over last 10 games of season to win title.

2B-Jose Amador, Saltillo (.355/18/79R): Bright spot in dismal year in Saltillo. Hit .324 or better each month of season.

3B-Marshall McDougall, Reynosa (.327/15/79): Ex-Florida State star returned from Asia to provide clutch hitting for Broncos.

SS-Domingo Castro, Reynosa (.321/2/58R): Slap hitter with little power has topped .300 mark all three years in Reynosa.

LF-Luis Terrero, Mexico City (.390/38/110/30SB): Ex-MLBer had monster year, only second 30/30 season in Liga history.

CF-Leo Heras, Mexico City (.342/18/60/25SB): Solid first year with Diablos, 5’8” 155-pounder socked career-high 18 HRs.

RF-Jorge Guzman, Veracruz (.290/39/97): Led Liga in HRs to form great 1-2 punch with Victor Diaz, raised BA 52 points.

C-Iker Franco, Quintana Roo (.276/23/74): Solid vet and clutch hitter led champs in HRs and RBIs, 72 HRs in last 4 years.

DH-Edgar Quintero, Monterrey (.357/32/78): Longtime star was backbone for surprising Sultanes despite tailing off late.

LHP-Marco Tovar, Reynosa (12-4/3.11/80K): Former reliever led Liga in ERA, tied for top in wins in second full year as starter.

RHP-Francisco Campos, Campeche (12-5/3.42/113K): Only got better as season progressed. The Salon de la Fama awaits.

RP-Sandy Nin, Quintana Roo (8-4/2.80/24SV): Led circuit in saves, won or saved 32 games. Only 15 walks in 70.2 IP.

MGR-Daniel Fernandez, Veracruz (54-49/.524/3rd): Rebuilt moribund team around pitching, led them to LMB South finals.

SUMMER 2011 BBM AWARDS Most Valuable Player: Luis Terrero, Mexico City Diablos Rojos

With two weeks to go in the regular season, Luis Terrero had a valid shot at winning no less than EIGHT offensive titles in the Mexican League for 2011: Batting average, hits, homers, RBIs, runs scored, slugging percentage, on-base percentage, on-base-plus-slugging percentage and stolen bases. And remember that the Liga is very much a hitter’s league.

While it’s true that Terrero had to settle for leading the LMB in runs, RBIs, slugging percentage and OPS while finishing second in batting average, homers and on-base percentage (he was “only” third in stolen bases) takes nothing away from what ended up being one of the most remarkable offensive seasons in any professional league in the past several years.

Talk is cheap, so let the numbers do the talking for us: .390 batting average, .485 on-base percentage, .770 slugging percentage, 1.254 on-base-plus-slugging percentage, 38 homers, 109 runs, 110 runs and 30 steals. We have hardcore researchers who read BBM: They’re all invited to find a single-season performance with those kinds of totals in Organized Baseball over the recent past. There may be someone who can match them, but I can’t think of him.

Luis Terrero not only deserves to be named Most Valuable Player by the LMB itself, anything short of a unanimous vote reflects a case of denial that belongs in the same room as Lindsay Lohan at the Betty Ford Clinic.

SUMMER 2011 BBM AWARDS Pitcher of the Year: Francisco Campos, Campeche Piratas

One of the things modern baseball managers need to be concerned with is overworking their pitchers. When one of those pitchers is 38 years old, in his 21st season of pro ball and relatively slight of stature at 5’11” and 185 pounds, the risk of having that hurler wear down in the hot summer months rises exponentially. Unless that pitcher is Francisco Campos.

The Campeche veteran not only didn’t lose steam over the steamy weeks of July in the Yucatan peninsula in the southern tip of Mexico, he actually seemed to get stronger. In his last ten starts in the regular season between June 1 and July 25, the man they call “Pancho Ponches” because he’s been perhaps the top strikeout artist in Mexico over the past two decades put together a 7-1 record with a 2.89 ERA, striking out 68 batters over 65 innings with just 16 walks (including only four free passes in 32.2 innings over his last five starts. In fact, in his last regular season outing against the eventual Liga champion Tigres in Cancun, Campos struck out nine while walking one batter in 5.1 frames. So much for wearing out.

For the season, the native of Guaymas registered a 12-5 record with a 3.42 ERA, including 138 whiffs and 38 walks in 137 innings while tying for the Liga lead in wins. Since debuting as a 17-year-old in 1995 with the Piratas (except for a 5-0 record in five starts with Monterrey in 2005, he’s never pitched for another LMB team), Campos has gone 146-85 with 1,604 strikeouts in 2,181 innings along with an ERA slightly under 3.00.

Campos may not just be the Liga’s best pitcher in 2011…he has a valid argument for being the best pitcher in Mexico of this generation.

SUMMER 2011 BBM AWARDS Playoff MVP: Pablo Ortega, Quintana Roo Tigres

Observers might’ve had an inkling that Ortega was in for a solid postseason when he narrowly missed a perfect game in his final start of the regular season, but even the wily right-handed veteran would’ve been hard-pressed to predict how well he’d pitch en route to the Tigres’ tenth Mexican League pennant since their first LMB season in 1955.

Ortega went on to win three games in four decisions among his five starts, giving up just four earned runs over his 32 playoff innings to post a microscopic 1.13 ERA. Although his control wasn’t as sharp as he’d have liked it in issuing 13 walks while hitting four other batsmen, the 35-year-old Nuevo Laredo product scattered 24 hits through three playoff rounds (and just one homer) in picking up a win in each series. Ortega helped Quintana Roo’s four-game sweep of powerful Mexico City in the Mexican Series by combining with relievers Juan Sandoval and Sandy Nin on a 1-0 shutout in front of a sellout crowd at home in Cancun on August 22.

The playoffs capped a terrific comeback year for Ortega, who looked like he might’ve been all but finished after a disastrous 2010 season in which he went 2-6 with an 8.24 ERA in 17 games for the Tigres after going 36-14 the previous three Liga campaigns. Instead, he turned in a 10-3 record during the 2011 regular season and finished third in the LMB with a 3.29 ERA, trailing only Reynosa’s Marco Tovar (3.11) and Puebla’s Andres Meza (3.14) before his sterling playoff work.

SUMMER 2011 BBM AWARDS Manager of the Year: Daniel Fernandez, Veracruz Aguilas

The Aguilas had an entirely forgettable 2010 in which they went 39-66 (winning just 15 of 52 games in the second half), but Veracruz native Fernandez took the reins last winter and led the Red Eagles to a solid 54-49 record and a berth in the Southern Zone finals against the Tigres. Veracruz was probably best-known for the 1-2 power punch of Liga home run champ Jorge Guzman and Victor Diaz, who combined for 73 longballs, but it was pitching that was the main reason for the Aguilas’ 16-game improvement over their 2010 showing.

Fernandez cobbled together a pitching staff led by starters Joel Vargas (11-7/3.60) and Juan Acevedo (9-5/3.68) plus relievers Hector Navarro (3-3/4.25/15 saves) and Jailen Peguero (5-0/1.40/8 saves) into one with the Liga’s lowest ERA at 4.24. Granted, the starting rotation was thin after Vargas and Acevedo, which makes the Aguilas’ season all the more remarkable, given that their .273 team batting average was the worst in the circuit.

The 2011 season serves as sweet vindication for Fernandez, a former Mexico City Diablos Rojos star who was dumped unceremoniously by the Diablos two years ago, one season after leading them to their last LMB pennant in his first year as mananger and then to the league’s best regular season record in 2009. Fernandez then spent 16 games in 2010 on the Tabasco managerial merry-go-round before getting canned with a 5-11 record with the hapless Olmecas.

SUMMER 2011 BAMMYS COMING THIS WEEK

Winners of the Summer 2011 Baseball Mexico Awards (otherwise lovingly known as the Bammys) will be announced this week, beginning Tuesday with the Mexican League Newcomer of the Year. Other awards include Manager of the Year (Wednesday), Pitcher of the Year (Thursday), Playoff MVP (Friday) and Most Valuable Player (Saturday). The BBM Summer All-Star Team will be released Sunday.

The BBM Awards are given out twice a year: Once for the Mexican Pacific League season in winter, and once for the Mexican League season in summer. Here is a list of past Bammy winners...

NEWCOMER OF THE YEAR
Summer 2010: Sandy Madera, Yucatan Leones
Winter 2011: Barbaro Canizares, Obregon Yaquis

MANAGER OF THE YEAR
Summer 2010: Eddie Diaz, Oaxaca Guerreros
Winter 2011: Matias Carrillo, Guasave Algodoneros

PITCHER OF THE YEAR
Summer 2010: Bobby Cramer, Quintana Roo Tigres
Winter 2011: Jose Silva, Culiacan Tomateros

PLAYOFF MVP
Winter 2011: Iker Franco, Obregon Yaquis

MOST VALUABLE PLAYER
Summer 2010: Willis Otanez, Puebla Pericos
Winter 2011: Justin Christian, Los Mochis Caneros

BBM TO RETURN IN JUNE

Hola Everybody,

After a nearly month-long hiatus brought on by a temporary added workload at my "real" job (the one that pays the bills), I'll be bringing Baseball Mexico back the first week of June. The format will undergo some minor surgery: There will be no more daily scores and highlights, but there WILL be three short-form stories per week (Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays) while a weekly capsule rundown for each LMB team is also planned for posting on weekends. I've cleared out the older posts on the blog's main page, but everything ever posted on BBM is still archived via the column on the right hand side.

The BBM Mexican League 2011 Season Guide will soon be on sale via eBay. With the LMB season at the midway point, it should be a valuable resource during the stretch drive of the regular season and the playoffs in August. If you don't want to wait for the Guide to be available on eBay, send me an email at BaseballMexico@live.com and I'll give you details on how you can order your copy directly. It's the only Mexican League guide available this year, and no serious fan really should be without it (in my humble opinion, of course).

Back Soon,
Bruce

Mexican League results for Tuesday, Apr. 19, 2011

After deciding to send the daily Mexican League results over to a new Baseball Mexico group page on Facebook and returning to the old short-story format three days a week on the BBM blog to address declining blog readership, it finally occurred to me:  Why can't I do both results AND stories on both Facebook and the blog?  Sometimes the best solutions are also the most obvious.  So without further dither or adieu, here are last night's LMB results:

REYNOSA 7-13-1, Monterrey 6-13-0
W-Castillo (1-0). L-Ramirez (0-2).
Yurendell de Caster scored on bases-loaded walkoff single by Eduardo Arredondo (pictured) in 9th for Broncos.

MINATITLAN 4-9-0, Saltillo 3-9-0
W-Rios (1-1). L-Hernandez (2-2).
Petros' Rolando Acosta stroked two-out RBI single for game-winner.

CAMPECHE 6-12-1, Laguna 5-9-0
W-Armenta (4-0). L-Figueroa (1-1).
Piratas received homers from Ruben Rivera, Jolbert Cabrera, Javier Robles and Jaime Valenzuela.

Mexico City 8-11-1, VERACRUZ 4-10-1
W-Quevedo (3-0). L-Cruz (3-1).
Diablos scored 7 runs in top of 3rd, including 2-run homer by Gabriel Gutierrez and solo blast by Luis Terrero, to cruise to road win.

TABASCO 6-10-0, Monclova 2-9-1
W-Sanchez (2-0). L-Verdugo (0-3).
Roberto Mendez went 3-for-4, scores 2 runs and drove in 2 more as Alfonso Sanchez let in 1 run over 5 innings for Olmecas.

QUINTANA ROO 3-5-1, Oaxaca 2-4-0
W-Ortega (2-1). L-Aguilar (1-2).
Ricardo Vazquez hit solo homer, scored on Abel Martinez single to support strong start by Pablo Ortega for Tigres.

YUCATAN 7-7-0, Puebla 6-16-0
W-Navarro (2-0). L-Perez (0-2).
Despite being outhit 16-7, Leones got 3 RBIs each from Said Gutierrez and Fernando Alejos as Pericos stranded 10 baserunners.