Need some recipe ideas for the holidays? Check out, “Cooking with the Emeralds:”
Enjoy!
~ baseballrebecca
Team Goes from Orphan to Eligible BATchelor to Eldest Child
On November 19, the Rochester Red Wings announced that they are the new triple-A affiliate of the Washington Nationals. This makes sense, since it was highly unlikely – even before COVID – that some of us Nats fans would ever get to California to see the AAA-affiliate in Fresno. So, now that they’re part of the family, I started following the Red Wings on Twitter – and have not been disappointed.
Going back to November 10, when the Red Wings found out they’d no longer be affiliated with the Minnesota Twins, they’d been sharing their angst on Twitter:
After some local attention, the Red Wings became proactive in the search for a new parent team:
Finally, it was announced on November 19, the Red Wings’ new MLB team would be the Washington Nationals:
Their bat dog also introduced himself to the new parent team:
To which the Nats replied:
Welcome to the family, Rochester Red Wings! Hopefully soon we’ll find out who your younger siblings will be!
~ baseballrebecca
Monday Baseball Motivation
Best of the Week: 11/15/2020 – 11/21/2020
This week, Brooks Robinson was named the winner of the Bob Feller Act of Valor Award in the National Baseball Hall of Fame category. The award is given to those who “possess the values, integrity, and dedication to serving our country exemplified by the award’s namesake, National Baseball Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Feller, who made the selfless decision to put his career in the Major Leagues on hold so he could serve his country.”
Each year, there are six awards: National Baseball Hall of Fame Award, Major League Baseball Award, U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer Award, U.S. Marine Corps Jerry Coleman Award, Peer to Peer Award (Afloat), and Peer to Peer Award (Ashore). Organizations supporting the awards include Major League Baseball, the Cleveland Indians, the Baseball Hall of Fame, the Marine Corps, the U.S. Navy, and the National Military Family Association.
The winner in the Major League Baseball category this year was Craig Stammen of the San Diego Padres.
Check out the video below of Brooks accepting the award. Congrats to all the winners!
~ baseballrebecca
Stat-urday, 11/21/2020
Since I wrote about the Mexican Pacific League earlier this week, I thought today would be a good day to post their recent stats, courtesy of Baseball Reference:
| Team | G | R | H | HR | BA | OBP | SLG | OPS |
| Sultanes de Monterrey | 17 | 96 | 179 | 11 | 0.301 | 0.369 | 0.431 | 0.800 |
| Algodoneros de Guasave | 19 | 102 | 195 | 12 | 0.295 | 0.369 | 0.411 | 0.780 |
| Naranjeros de Hermosillo | 17 | 91 | 154 | 12 | 0.279 | 0.366 | 0.404 | 0.770 |
| Tomateros de Culiacan | 20 | 103 | 199 | 21 | 0.292 | 0.357 | 0.443 | 0.801 |
| Yaquis de Obregon | 20 | 103 | 173 | 21 | 0.265 | 0.359 | 0.419 | 0.778 |
| Charros de Jalisco | 20 | 95 | 195 | 20 | 0.287 | 0.351 | 0.430 | 0.781 |
| Venados de Mazatlan | 19 | 88 | 161 | 7 | 0.254 | 0.342 | 0.337 | 0.679 |
| Mayos de Navojoa | 20 | 90 | 160 | 12 | 0.250 | 0.345 | 0.350 | 0.695 |
| Aguilas de Mexicali | 20 | 76 | 160 | 13 | 0.240 | 0.319 | 0.342 | 0.661 |
| Caneros de Los Mochis | 20 | 75 | 164 | 18 | 0.251 | 0.329 | 0.375 | 0.704 |
Happy Stat-urday!
~ baseballrebecca
Films on Friday: Toros del Este
How to Watch Victor Robles in the Dominican Winter League
Have you been missing watching Victor Robles hit home runs? Well, I’ve discovered a way to watch him in the Dominican Winter League!
For starters, if you want game summaries from games in the DR, check out the DR Sports channel on YouTube. For example, they have footage of Tuesday night’s Robles home run:
Some of the teams also have summaries (resumen) and other videos on their YouTube channels:
- Águilas Cibaeñas
- Estrellas Orientales
- Gigantes del Cibao
- Leones del Escogido
- Tigres del Licey
- Toros del Este
As with other non-U.S. leagues, information on baseball in the Dominican Republic is sometimes hard to come by in this country. There are sites that appear to stream games, but I haven’t been able to find a lot of information about them. For example, the YouTube channel, Baseball Dominicano has some games available, but I’ve found no information on who operates the channel or what they plan to stream live. And, of course, there’s an app for that: the Baseball RD app (available in the Google Play app store) claims to allow you to watch Dominican Winter League games for free. But I haven’t checked it out yet, so I can’t necessarily recommend it.
If anyone has any information or intel on these and other sites that stream games, please let me know!
And if you’re still missing Victor, here are some photos from Tuesday night’s game:
~ baseballrebecca
Winter Leagues: DR Baseball
Winter baseball in the Dominican Republic began on Sunday, November 15; the regular season will run through December 10. The post-season will be comprised of three rounds beginning with a 3-game series December 21-23, followed by a semi-final series from December 26 to January 4. The best of seven championship series would end on January 15 if it extends to all seven games.
La Liga de Béisbol Profesional de la República Dominicana (LIDOM) consists of six teams:
- Águilas Cibaeñas
- Estrellas Orientales
- Gigantes del Cibao
- Leones del Escogido
- Tigres del Licey
- Toros del Este
The cool thing about the LIDOM teams is that there are a lot of current and former Major Leaguers (and Minor Leaguers) on the teams, including: Victor Robles, Wilmer Difo, and Wellington Castillo on the Aguilas Cibaeñas; Wander Franco and Tres Barrera on the Escogido team; Miguel Andujar on Estrellas Orientales; and Sandy Leon on Tigres del Licey.
The league’s website doesn’t seem to always work. Fortunately, they post a LOT of stuff on Twitter, including the 2020-21 schedule, their rosters, and daily lineups. You can also see the day-to-day schedule, scores, and Game Day for each team on the MLB website for the Winter Leagues.
Winter Leagues: Mexican Pacific League
You may have overlooked the beginning of the Liga Mexicana del Pacifico (LMP), or Mexican Pacific League, season, which began a month ago when the United States was focused on other things. Unfortunately, the league recently had to pause for 11 days due to COVID-19 outbreaks on several teams. They are scheduled to resume their season today, but will not make up the cancelled games.
As of November 6, when the games were suspended, los Yaquis de Obregon were in first place with a record of 17-3:
| Team | Won | Lost | W-L% | GB | |
| 1 | Yaquis de Obregon | 17 | 3 | .850 | — |
| 2 | Naranjeros de Hermosillo | 12 | 5 | .706 | 3.5 |
| 3 | Sultanes de Monterrey | 11 | 6 | .647 | 4.5 |
| 4 | Tomateros de Culiacan | 11 | 9 | .550 | 6 |
| 5 | Charros de Jalisco | 9 | 11 | .450 | 8 |
| 6 | Aguilas de Mexicali | 8 | 12 | .400 | 9 |
| 7 | Caneros de Los Mochis | 8 | 12 | .400 | 9 |
| 8 | Algodoneros de Guasave | 7 | 12 | .368 | 9.5 |
| 9 | Venados de Mazatlan | 7 | 12 | .368 | 9.5 |
| 10 | Mayos de Navojoa | 6 | 14 | .300 | 11 |
One of my two favorite LMP players, Dariel Alvarez of los Charros de Jalisco, was leading his team in batting, with a batting average of .357. His teammate and my other favorite LMP player, Henry Urrutia, had the second highest batting average on the team at .329. Last year, Alvarez lead the league in home runs (16), RBI (56), and slugging (.527) and was named Jugador Mas Valioso (Most Valuable Player).
The LMP 2020-21 schedule runs through December 30. The playoffs begin in early January with eight teams, culminating in the winner representing Mexico in the Caribbean Series. For more info on the LMP, check out these links:
- LMP official website
- LMP 2020-21 schedule (at Baseball Mexico on Blogspot)
- Liga Mexicana del Pacifico (on Wikipedia – the Spanish version has more info)
- Mexican Pacific League info on Baseball Reference
- Mexican Pacific League stats on Baseball Reference
- LMP daily schedule on MLB.com
~ baseballrebecca
Monday Baseball Motivation
If my uniform doesn’t get dirty, I haven’t done anything in the baseball game.
– Rickey Henderson
