Puerto Rico hosted the Baseball Caribbean series of baseball. It was a big
event. Because of the Major League strike, many of the best Latin players that
normally are not given permission to play were playing. More on that farther
down this letter. At the opening ceremonies, Margarita, Jose Roman, and Cindy
Torres, along with three persons on stilts & three jugglers did a 5 minute funny
sketch. The stadium was filled to capacity, 21,000 fans + local TV + TV to other
LatinAmerican countries & TV tu the USA Spanish speaking nations. Margarita hit
a “home run” on her unicycle. Jose Roman played third base. One of the men on
stilts tried to steal third base. Jose rode between his legs, then came from
behind, and carried the runner on his (Jose’s) shoulders back to second base. Of
course, without dismounting. At another time Jose carried Cindy on his shoulder.
She was standing up on his shoulder who had the third base bag. We have natural
grass on our stadium, and it is not as well kept as the major league stadiums. I
still don’t know how Jose can do all those things. I thought it was very
interesting how we could mix two different disciplines, stilts & unis, each with
their own rythm and coming out with such a good end product. Back to baseball.
Venezuela, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, & Puerto Rico participated in a
round-robin where every team played each other twice. Puerto Rico & the
Dominicans clearly had the best two teams. The Dominicans has a big leaguer on
almost every position. Their two starters against Puerto Rico were Jose Rijo who
plays for Cincinatti (and who many consider the best pitcher in the NL) and
Pedro Martinez of Montreal, one of the best young arms in baseball. Neither
could get past the fourth inning against PR. Position players included NL Rookie
of the year Raul Mondesi & Houston’s Andujar Cedeno. They were coaches by Art
Howe. At catcher we had Carlos Delgado who played some left field for Toronto, &
Javi Lopez of Atlanta. AL All-Star Ivan Rodriguez didn’t make the team. At first
base our only none big leaguer, Carmelo Martinez. Second base, Roberto Alomar,
AL All-Star from Toronto, SS Ray Sanchez from the Cubs. Third Base, Carlos
Baerga AL All-Star from Cleveland. LF Juan Gonzalez AL All-Star from Texas.
Home-Run Champ the last two big leagues complete seasons. CF, Bernie Williams,
from the NY Yankees. RF Ruben Sierra AL All-Star from Oakland, DH Edgar Martinez
who plays for Seattle in the AL & was the 1993 AL batting champion. PR won.
Rickie Bones of Milwaukee pitches the clincher. Roberto Hernandez of the White
Sox finished the game for him. The Dominicans were second losing only the two
games against us. Roberto Alomar was the MVP.