March 2010
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Chapman likely to start in minors, but Reds have...
Looks like the back injury Aroldis Chapman sustained this spring will force him to start the season in the minors, delaying the 22-year-old Cuban defector’s debut with the Cincinnati Reds.
As potentially important as Chapman’s debut could be for the 2010 Reds, the team was involved in a more historically significant debut … in 1911.
That was the season Armando Marsans (top row,...
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March 19, 1887: 'El Diamante Negro' Jose Mendez...
On this date in 1887, one of the greatest pitchers in the Cuban baseball history was born in Cárdenas.
Jose Mendez, El Diamante Negro, would go on to star in Cuba — mostly playing for Almendares along with one-year stints each with Santa Clara (below), Matanzas and Habana — and in the Negro Leagues with teams, such as the Kansas City Monarchs and Cuban Stars.
A look at the...
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Best Cuban pitchers in history
The hype surrounding Cuban defector Aroldis Chapman continues to ratchet up after his first spring training start for the Cincinnati Reds on Wednesday.
After hitting 102 mph on the radar gun in his Cactus League debut on March 8, the 22-year-old lefty — after allowing a home run to the first batter he faced — was “almost untouchable,” striking out five batters in three...
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Cuba's spring training history
Long before Florida and Arizona came to monopolize spring training, major league teams would set up camp in small towns all across the country to prepare for upcoming seasons.
Occasionally they even ventured to cities beyond America’s borders, including Havana, Cuba.
According to Cuban Ball, the Federal League’s St. Louis Terriers, with Cuban outfielder Armando Marsans, was the first...
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Today's Cuban Series very different from winter...
The 49th Cuban National Baseball Series began earlier this month and already has featured a wild bench-clearing brawl.
But the list of participating teams is a stark reminder of the fight that was lost five decades ago: Industriales, Villa Clara, Sancti Spiritus, Santiago de Cuba, Guantanamo, Ciego de Avila.
Yes, the series includes La Habana and Cienfuegos (the team’s logo even contains...
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Cuban Sports Hall of Fame honors Dodgers' Tommy...
That’s 16 Halls of Fame and counting.
Former Los Angeles Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda, now a special assistant with the team, was inducted Sunday into the Cuban Sports Hall of Fame during a ceremony in Miami, Fla.
“I am very proud to be inducted into the Cuban Sports Hall of Fame,” said Lasorda in a statement released by the Dodgers. “I loved my time in Cuba and am very...
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El Gran Stadium, my uncle were once part of a plot...
This is a baseball story only in its setting: Opening night of the Havana Sugar Kings’ inaugural 1954 season.
My uncle and future godfather, René Brioso, sat with conspirators toward right field in the last row of El Gran Stadium of Havana.
But they weren’t watching the International League game. Instead they looked out beyond the outfield fences toward the rooftop of a building...
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Old photo launches interest in Cuban baseball
Many years ago while looking through a box of old family photographs, I came across a black-and-white image of my father (left) from the late 1940s.
In it, he couldn’t have been much more than 10 or 11 years old, and I felt as if I could have been looking at a picture of myself at that age were it not for the clothes and the photo’s lack of color.
The baseball cap with the serifed...