Leon win streak snapped at 11; Bravos fourth in LMB South

Leon Bravos pitcher Dustin Crenshaw

Danny Vasquez' two-run single in the top of the second inning gave Campeche a 4-3 lead in Leon and the Piratas pulled away to an 8-3 Mexican League win over the Bravos Sunday afternoon at Parque Domingo Santana.  The defeat ended an eleven-game win streak for the surprising Bravos, who have moved into the fourth and final playoff slot in the LMB South with a 22-17 record, three games behind third-place Mexico City but four games up on defending division champion Puebla with three weeks remaining in the Liga's Spring 2018 season.

Leon had posted their eleventh straight victory Saturday night with a 5-3 triumph over the visiting Piratas when consecutive RBI singles by Junior Lake and Quincy Latimore in the bottom of the seventh broke a 3-all tie and gave Eder Llamas the win out of the bullpen.  Llamas was one of seven relievers to follow starter Dustin Crenshaw, who tossed 5.1 innings for the Bravos and gave up two runs (one earned) on six hits and no walks, striking out two Campeche batsmen.  Leon was 11-16 when they began their skein on Tuesday, April 24 with a 5-1 win at Tabasco despite batting only 2-for-12 with runners in scoring position.

Manager Luis Carlos Rivera's team is second in the league with a .322 batting average (trailing only Durango's .329) while the Bravos' 48 homers tops the loop.  Leon has three batters in the top ten: outfielder Felix Pie (sixth at .392), shortstop Amadeo Zazueta (eighth at .381) and second baseman Niko Vasquez (ninth at .376) while Pie is tied for third in homers with nine.  The Bravos' pitching has been middle-of-the-road with a 5.08 ERA, ninth in the 16-team league, although Crenshaw has done well so far with a 3-1 record and a 3.30 ERA over eight starts, winning the first game of the streak in Villahermosa and picking up another W five nights later in Campeche.  Leon barely snuck into the playoffs last year in their debut season, but with Puebla fading badly (losing nine of their last ten) and only 21 games left in the abbreviated regular season, the Bravos are sitting pretty.

While Leon has zoomed past Puebla for fourth in the LMB South, there remains a spirited three-team battle for the division lead, with Yucatan (27-12) holding a one-game lead over another surprising team, Quintana Roo (25-12) while Mexico City (25-14) is two games out of first.  The Tigres, who were not expected to contend this year under new manager Tim Johnson, have won eight of their last ten to vault past the Diablos Rojos into second heading into a crucial three-game set against Leon opening Tuesday in Cancun.  In the LMB North, Monterrey (26-13) won two of three games in Dos Laredos over the weekend to maintain a 3-5-game lead over defending Liga champs Tijuana (22-16).  The Sultanes topped the Tecolotes, 8-4, Sunday at Uni-Trade Stadium in Laredo as DH Yadir Drake came one homer shy of hitting for the cycle, scoring twice and driving in two more runs.  Aguascalientes (22-17) and Monclova (20-18) hold the final two Zona Norte playoff berths with none of the division's other four teams within five games of the .500 mark.

First-year Durango first baseman Dustin Geiger, a former Cubs and Marlins farmhand, leads the Mexican League with a .408 batting average, six points ahead of Puebla first sacker Daric Barton.  Monterrey's Ricky Alvarez is tops with 13 homers and tied with Tijuana's Cyle Hankerd for the RBI lead at 41 while Hankerd's Toros teammate Justin Greene's 18 stolen bases leads the league despite Greene only playing twice since April 24.  Pitcher Carlos Hernandez (also of Tijuana) pitched six innings in the Toros' 7-1 home win over Saltillo Saturday to post his sixth victory of the Spring, best in the LMB.  Yucatan's Jose Samayoa's 2.17 ERA leads all starters, Josh Lowey of Monclova looks like a lock for another strikeout title with 58 (17 more than his nearest rival) and former MLBer Josh Lueke of the Acereros has ten saves to top Liga closers in that category.

Coming up this week is a huge series in Tijuana, where the Toros host LMB North-leading Monterrey in a three-game set starting Tuesday.  Next weekend's top series will be in Cancun when the Tigres host Mexico City in a renewal of Mexican baseball's oldest rivalry, which has been spiced up by the Rookiegate scandal and Tigres owner Fernando Valenzuela's open frustration over the Liga office's "What Me Worry?" response.


First MLB no-hitter in Mexico tossed during series in Monterrey

Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Walker Buehler

As if there wasn't enough history being made last weekend in Monterrey, where Major League Baseball played its first regular season games since 1999, Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Walker Buehler combined with three relievers to toss the first MLB no-hitter outside the USA and Canada on Friday night in the Dodgers' 4-0 win over San Diego at Estadio Monterrey.  Five no-hitters had been spun in Montreal or Toronto previously.

Buehler, a 23-year-old righty who was the Dodgers' 2015 first-round draft pick, pitched the first six hitless innings for Los Angeles, striking out eight and walking three to go to 2-0 on the season.  He was followed in order by relievers Adam Cimber, Kazuhisa Makita and Phil Maton, each of whom contributing a hitless frame to seal the no-no for the Dodgers, who then lost the last two games of the series.  San Diego evened the set Saturday with a 7-4 triumph behind two-run homers by first baseman Eric Hosmer and catcher Rafael Lopez, then took Sunday's rubber match by shutting out the defending National League champs, 4-0, as starter Eric Lauer combined with three relievers to scatter eight hits while Hosmer homered once more with a two-run shot in the bottom of the fifth.

While Buehler and his bullpen mates stole the lion's share of attention for the series on Friday night, it ended up being three games that Padres third baseman Christian Villanueva would probably just as soon put in the taillights.  Villanueva, a Guadalajara native who has received much early notice as a potential Rookie of the Year candidate, went 0-for-11 over the series and committed two errors in the field Sunday.  Villanueva has gone 1-for-20 in May to bring his season batting average, which stood at .355 on April 22, down to .265 after Sunday's contest.

The series, which sold out in less than two hours, was well-received by fans and media alike as a total of 65,116 attendees in 22,000-seat Estadio Monterrey.  The success of the Mexico Series brought out calls for a future MLB team south of the border, either in Monterrey or Mexico City.  MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred said during Friday's ESPN2 broadcast that both Mexico and Montreal are potential candidates for expansion teams, but some Mexican baseball columnists quickly pointed out that the country's political and financial instability would be tough obstacles to overcome and that it's a lot harder to get people to attend 81 home games as opposed to a single three-game series.


Mazatlan Venados tab Joe Alvarez as new skipper

New Mazatlan Venados manager Joe Alvarez

The Mazatlan Venados front office decided after last winter that one season with Daniel Fernandez as manager of the Mexican Pacific League team was enough and that a change was needed at the helm.  After a months-long search, the Venados last week introduced Cuban-born Joe Alvarez as their pilot for the 2018-19 LMP campaign.

The 61-year-old Alvarez will make his LMP managerial debut with Mazatlan this October, but he is no stranger to the MexPac after previously serving as a coach with the Obregon Yaquis under Eddie Diaz.  However, Alvarez' Mexican baseball bonafides have been mostly been built in the Mexican League.  After winning Gulf Coast League pennants in 1986 and 1987 managing the Dodgers' Rookie league entry and a Florida State League title with Vero Beach in 1990, the former minor league infielder spent time in the Rays and Phillies organizations before taking over in Puebla on an interim basis in 2014 after Houston Jimenez was fired during the season.  Alvarez then guided the Pericos to second place in the LMB South and won playoff series against Campeche and Quintana Roo before falling to Mexico City in the Serie del Rey for the Liga pennant.

He went on to serve as a coach with the Korea Baseball Organization's SK Wyverns before returning to Mexico last summer as manager in Durango, leading the Generales to a .500 record playing the first month on the road while their ballpark was undergoing renovations.  The team eventually fell victim to injuries and front office mismanagement and finished seventh in the LMB South with a 43-66 record.  Alvarez could hardly be blamed for the Generales' misfortunes, but he was not rehired after the 2017 season.

Alvarez, who was born in Manzanillo, Cuba but attended high school in New Jersey before making his pro baseball debut in 1974 in the Yankees organization (later playing in the Astros and Orioles systems), takes over a Mazatlan team that finished the regular season with a 37-31 record and qualified for the postseason under Fernandez before falling to defending MexPac champion Mexicali in the first round, four games to two.

LMB to play two seasons from April to November in 2018

LMB Assembly (with Javier Salinas on microphone)

The Mexican League has formally announced that it will be playing two shorter seasons during the 2018 calendar year, beginning in April and ending in November.  The announcement came at the Liga's Assembly of Presidents meeting Thursday in Mexico City. The plan is for two separate 66-game regular season schedules with playoffs, bridged by a one-week rest in July during which the LMB's All-Star Game (there'll be just one of those) is played.

While the move, approximating the country's popular Liga MX soccer circuit's Apertura and Clausura tournaments (which drew crowds of about 27,000 per match for its 2016-17 seasons), represents a radical departure from baseball orthodoxy, Minor League Baseball president Pat O'Connor was in attendance at Thursday's meeting and endorsed the move.  O'Connor, you may recall, was compelled to call an emergency meeting of LMB teams in February when internecine squabbling threatened to tear the 16 teams into two leagues or cancel the 2017 season altogether.  Instead of two leagues, now we'll see two seasons for 2018.

Currently, the Liga plays a single 112-game regular season schedule from early April to mid-August, followed by a three-tiered, eight-team playoff lasting about a month into mid-September.  The new format will include two 66-game regular seasons followed by playoffs, with the LMB's "Apertura" lasting from April to July and their "Clausura" running from August into November.  The notion of a two-season format was floated last month in a reference made by incoming league president Javier Salinas, whose background has been (not so ironically, apparently) entirely as a Liga MX marketing executive.  There was no word whether Salinas was going to divide the LMB into eight-team Premier and First Divisions with promotion/relegation playoffs for 2018, but it's only July.

Salinas, who will replace retiring LMB president Plinio Escalante at the conclusion of the current season and has been serving as a de facto co-president, addressed the addition of 20 games and a separate playoff to a league in which half its teams are teetering on economic collapse.  "The cost is relative," he said.  "You can raise or lower it.  If you qualify for the playoffs, it decreases.  If you manage your team better, the same. Each team is independent and will have the economic strategy that suits them best."  Salinas and the LMB team presidents will be relying on added sponsorships next season to help offset the added expenses accrued from lengthening the overall season two months for teams like the Tabasco Olmecas, who had 178 warm bodies rattling around Estadio Centenario 27 de Febrero for a game against Yucatan earlier this month, and the Durango Generales, who've had some players refusing to play because they hadn't been paid in weeks.

Prior to Thursday's press conference from the Assembly meeting, the two-season proposal had drawn almost universal skepticism from Mexican baseball's print commentators, but the move may ultimately draw the strongest reaction from the Mexican Pacific League.  While the LMB has eleven teams drawing fewer than 5,000 fans per night (seven clubs are bringing in fewer than 3,000 per opening), the MexPac has built itself into a juggernaut with a leaguewide attendance average of just under 10,000 per game, a figure that dwarfs every league in organized Minor League Baseball.  The LMP season traditionally opens in mid-October, meaning the LMB's Clausura will overlap the MexPac schedule by about a month.  

According to Beatriz Pereyra of Proceso, the LMB will require players to sign contracts for both seasons, thus cutting the player pool for the MexPac.  Thus far, LMP president Omar Canizales has been silent on this topic, but it's expected by some that his league will respond by opening their rosters to more imported talent from the United States to fill the void while the Liga plays out its Clausura season.  In effect, the LMB's lengthening of its schedule is a declaration of war on the LMP, which has in the recent past explored expansion into Liga cities like Monterrey, Tijuana and even Mexico City. 

Whatever happens, the LMB will likely have the backing of Major League Baseball and commissioner Rob Manfred, which recently gave the Liga their version of the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval despite the financial mess many Mexican League teams are in.  According to Pereyra, three teams (Durango, Leon and Saltillo) each owe the Liga MX$15 million in assessments for 2017, with Leon owner Arturo Blanco owing another 900 thousand pesos toward the purchase price of the former Reynosa Broncos, while several other LMB franchises owe MX$2.5 million to the league office. 

One of those teams, the Veracruz Rojos del Aguila, are looking to move, possibly to Nuevo Laredo. The Eagles are currently eleventh in the LMB attendance derby with a per-game average of 2,647. Team president Jose Antonio Mansur backtracked a bit by later stating he would keep the team in the port city if attendance improves over the rest of the current season, during which the 40-49 Rojos del Aguila have been a playoff contender in the weak South Division.  

The club has been a past recipient of government subsidies to remain afloat, a common occurance with several LMB franchises.  However, the exiled ex-State of Veracruz governor responsible for recent largesse, Javier Duarte, was arrested outside the country in April after a six-month manhunt and is facing charges of pilfering millions of dollars from public coffers, as are many of his associates.  Duarte was extradited from Guatemala City earlier this week.  In all, eight former Mexican governors have been indicted for similar crimes and their successors have typically reined in past subsidies to sports teams that have relied on them to meet payroll, among other expenses.

In all, the LMB's break from baseball tradition would be fascinating to observe, let alone report on, under any circumstance.  That the Liga is doing so amid internal financial peril to so many of its teams accentuates how badly Salinas and the owners will need this to work in order to bring fans in through the gates and sponsorship pesos to team bank accounts.  We'll be watching.

P.S.  The LMB also announced the return of its Mexican Winter League for a third season, opening on October 20.  The six-team LIM, considered Class A in the country's baseball system, is a prospect-oriented circuit that allows only Mexican-born players.  It's presumed the loop will play a single-season schedule.

Postscripts from the WBC Pool D and Guadalajara

After taking a day to let the dust settle after Venezuela slipped past Italy, 4-3, Monday to cop the second and final World Baseball Classic second round berth out of Pool D play in Guadalajara, let's look at the aftermath of the goings-on at Estadio Charros between last Thursday and Monday and the potential longer-term ramifications.

First of all, I've heard from a longtime BBM reader who has a great deal of experience in an official capacity at international baseball tournaments in both hemispheres and whose opinion I trust.  What I'm told is that the formula used to determine that Venezuela, not Mexico, would advance to Monday's tiebreaker game against Italy was set prior to the opening of the WBC and applied in the wake of Mexico's 11-9 victory over Venezuela, a game that took nearly five hours to complete nine innings and didn't conclude until nearly 2AM in Guadalajara.

The sticking point among Mexican officials in the hours that followed was how to interpret  Italy's five-run ninth inning in their 10-9 upset of the host country Friday night, a frame in which MLBers Roberto Osuna and Oliver Perez failed to record a single out before John Andreoli's game-winning single ended the game.  There was much heated debate over how the tiebreaker formula should be applied, but the WBC's initial erroneous tweet that Mexico had advanced to play Italy Monday night likely caused more damage to the tournament's credibility than than any calculator did.  The blowback could be seen at Estadio Charros during Monday's game, when only 1,783 people (possibly a WBC record for smallest attendance at a single game) rattled around the stands after the six previous contests drew a total of 84,349 for an average of 14,058 per opening.  A Mexico-Italy tiebreaker likely would have pushed the five-day attendance total to over 100,000.

By the way, here's an explanation of how the tiebreaker rule was used, courtesy of USA Today and Sports Illustrated via Wikipedia:  The first tiebreaker criterion is fewest runs allowed per defensive inning played(RA/IPD) in the games between the tied teams. Mexico allowed 19 runs, Italy allowed 20 runs, and Venezuela allowed 21 runs. Italy and Venezuela played 19 innings each in the two games, therefore their RA/IPD were 1.053 and 1.105. Mexico played 18 innings, but they recorded no outs in the ninth inning of their game versus Italy, therefore the inning did not count towards their RA/IPD of 1.117; however the five runs scored in the same half inning by Italy did count against Mexico's RA/IPD.  Whatever one thinks of the outcome, those ARE the rules, my source says they were followed as written and I believe him.

One result of the postgame imbroglio is that Mexican team captain Adrian Gonzalez (pictured) says that this will be his last WBC regardless of whether he's still playing in 2021.  This is significant in that "El Titan" has been a mainstay for Mexico at every WBC since its inaugural tournament in 2006 and made the trip to Jalisco despite battling a version of tennis elbow since last winter that had kept him out of the Los Angeles Dodgers lineup for spring training games in Arizona.  The rust showed, as Gonzalez went just 1-for-12 at the plate in three Pool D games, but hthe Dodgers All-Star's openly-stated desire to make the trip and play through pain is a testament of his commitment to suiting up for Mexico and his brother, manager Edgar Gonzalez.  Father David Gonzalez, a Mexican baseball coach for decades, was on the WBC staff as well.  Adrian has been known to voice his displeasure in the past and his comment Monday that the WBC "is trying to be the World Cup, but they're not even the Little League World Series" would qualify, but he may change his mind in four years.  Or not.

This touches on another aspect of the WBC that has plagued many teams other than Mexico's:  Staging the event two weeks into MLB training camps means players are not showing up for the WBC in game shape.  This was never clearer than on Friday, when Toronto closer Osuna (who saved 36 games for the Jays last season) was knocked around by Italian batters before being yanked for Perez, who did pitch over the winter for Culiacan in the Mexican Pacific League, but Gonzalez and Osuna were hardly the only cases of players representing their countries in the WBC before their bodies were ready.  Many Mexican baseball columnists have questioned the wisdom of bypassing players who'd spent the winter in the MexPac or other such leagues in favor of some more accomplished but out-of-shape big leaguers. The emergence of Israel and The Netherlands from Pool A with teams consisting largely of minor leaguers did not go unnoticed.

There was some controversy in Guadalajara even before Sunday night's marathon.  Just before the ninth inning of Puerto Rico's 9-4 win over Mexico, fighting broke out in the family section of the stands in left field foul territory, causing members of the Puerto Rican team to come out of their dugout to check on family and friends who were sitting there.  All-Star catcher Yadier Molina later tweeted, "MLB,,,its a shame that you are more interested in making money and not in the security of our family when you were supposed to have security for them,, Horrible organization for this event, no security for the players family ,, its a shame MLB..."  In fairness, I've seen no reports than any WBC player's family members were caught up in the disturbance, but it was a tense situation.  Molina is not alone among players and others criticizing how the event was put together in Jalisco, but his comments have perhaps drawn the most attention.

One other incident on Saturday was the ninth-inning home plate collision between Italian baserunner Drew Butera and Venezuelan catcher Salvador Perez, whose backup in Kansas City is...Drew Butera.  Replays imply no malice on the part of Butera, who appeared to stumble into Butera in front of the plate while trying to score the game-winning run from first on a Gavin Cecchini single, but the result was something that makes every MLB general manager cringe as Perez (a four-time All-Star) was helped off the field, taken out of the game and given two MRIs for a knee injury.  Perez says he'll be ready for Opening Day of the Royals' season, but longstanding concerns over prominent MLB players getting injured in the WBC were reignited.

So what do I take from all this in my own more-or-less final analysis?  When you have top players avoiding the WBC the way NFL players avoid the Pro Bowl, you have a problem.  When some general managers discourage players from participating in the WBC, you have a problem.  When you have inspired minor leaguers representing nations not known as baseball hotbeds (hello, Israel) advancing to the next stage while more accomplished and better-paid players (hello, South Korea) are knocked out by the upstarts, you have a problem.  When you have All-Stars saying they will never again play for their national team in your tournament, you have a problem.  When most fans in MLB cities across North America show no interest in your tournament to begin with, you have a problem.  When sources say this may be the last WBC anyway if it doesn't pencil out financially for MLB, you REALLY have a problem.

I love the concept (if not the execution) behind the World Baseball Classic, but I just don't see this event continuing in this form after next weekend.  The negatives simply outweigh the positives.  While MLB commissioner Rob Manfred has said he wants the WBC continue, this was Bud Selig's baby and Selig's retirement took away the tournament's most vigilant defender.  The clock is ticking.