Record nine Dominicans to play in MLB All-Star Game

Dominican player David Ortiz is appearing in his
9th All-Star Game. Photo by Aaron Donovan.

The 2013 MLB All-Star Game features a a record nine Dominican baseball players. The total number of Latin and Dominican players has been on the upswing over the last decade-plus, and those higher numbers of total players undoubtedly leads to more Latins and Dominicans participating in the mid-summer classic. Last year in the 2012 All-Star Game eight Dominican players were featured in the game.

The American League All-Star roster features starters and perennial All-Stars Robinson Cano, Jose Bautista, and David Ortiz. It also features Dominicans Bortolo Colon, Jhonny Peralta, Nelson Cruz, and Edwin Encarnacion. No shortage of drama here, as you can see that Colon, Peralta, and Cruz are all mired in steroid accusations and could be suspended before the end of the year. But alas, they have been named to the team.

Featured on the National League roster are just two Dominican players. Jean Segura is appearing in his first All-Star game, after just a little over a years in the majors. He had a respectable season for part of last year with the Brewers, and then he tore up the Dominican Winter League in the off-season with the Gigantes del Cibao. The other Dominican player on the National League roster is Segura's teammate in Milwaukee Carlos Gomez.

This is the Dominican players that plan to play as of now. The Dominican Baseball Guy is somewhat perplexed at the All-Star carosuel. I beleive Colon is out due to injury or he is a replacement player, but is not playing. I thought Cruz was out injured as well. Big Papi will probably come up once, swing for the fences, and sit down. Who really knows?

In the end, nine Dominican players have been named to the 2013 MLB All-Star game. We will all tune in tonight to see which ones play.

Can the Dominican Republic Win the World Baseball Classic?

After a semi final loss in the first World Baseball Classic, and a national catastrophe first-round exit in 2009, the Dominican Republic has the pressure of the nation on them to win their first world title in the unilateral national sport. Even Dominican President Danilo Medina recently implored the Dominican team to 'lift up the country' with their World Baseball Classic performance.

Anything less than winning the whole thing will be a disappointment in the country with more MLB players per capita than any country in the world. There were 95 Dominican Baseball Players on MLB Rosters 2012, which was 11% of the league. Virtually everyone in the country has an opinion about baseball, known as 'pelota' or simply 'ball' in the Dominican Republic.

Dominican short stop Jose Reyes talked with USA Today. "The first two Classics were a bit disappointing for us. We had great teams and didn't do much," said Reyes. "This time we want to bring the crown back to the Dominican people."

Dominican native and MLB veteran Moises Alou has been a successful General Manager for Escogido in the Dominican Winter League, and he is heading up the World Baseball Classic team as well. He has replaced the power laden lineup from 2009 with a lineup based on speed and contact. Dominican players like Reyes, Erick Aybar and Alejandro De Aza fit that mold. Even the power heavy players like Robinson Cano, Hanley Ramirez, Edwin Encarnacion, Carlos Santana and Nelson Cruz are more rounded than power players like Jose Bautista and David Ortiz in previous years.

The bookies tend to agree with Alou and the Dominican public. The Dominican Republic is a 3-1 co-favorite to win the World Baseball Classic. The team has backed up this confidence from the public in their two exhibition games, beating the Phillies with 30 hits Tuesday and downing the Yankees 8-2 on Wedensday.

Dominican Republic World Baseball
Classic manager, Tony Pena, is currently
bench coach for the Yankees.

The Dominicans, led by Yankee bench coach and former big league Dominican native Tony Pena, look to build on this chemistry. Their first game is Thursday evening in Pool C in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Team Dominican Republic could even add Adrian Beltre to the All-Star heavy lineup in the second round. "We take a lot of pride in trying to be the best we can. We have a lot of players that play in the big leagues, so we have quite a list of players," Beltre told ESPN. "Coming into the Classic the first time, we thought we'd do a better job than we did as a team. After that, we didn't meet our expectations, and I think the fans and the players were more into it because they know we can do better."

"Every three or four years, they expect us to do well. They look forward to it."

Tony Pena is a legend in the Dominican Republic. Expect him to bring together all the high priced talent and lead them to the final round. On paper they are certainly one of the top two teams, along with the USA. They should see Asian bracket winners Japan and Cuba in the final round.

Pool: C — San Juan, Puerto Rico
First Dominican Republic game: Thursday, March 7 — vs. Venezuela

Infield: Robinson Cano, Jose Reyes, Hanley Ramirez, Leury Garcia, Miguel Tejada
Outfield: Nelson Cruz, Alejandro de Aza, Eury Perez, Ricardo Nanita, Moises Sierra

Starters: Edinson Volquez, Wandy Rodriguez, Sam Deduno
Bullpen: Fernando Rodney, Santiago Casilla, Octavio Dotel, Jose Veras, Jose Valverde
Catchers: Francisco Pena, Carlos Santana

For more information on the tournament see the official World Baseball Classic site.

Dominican baseball player Jose Bautista to have season ending surgery

Dominican baseball player Jose Bautista burst on to the Major League Baseball scene two years ago and led the league in home runs. He did it again last year. And he was possibly on pace to lead the majors in home runs for a third strait year, as he had 27 home runs through 92 games.

But, after trying to work through a wrist injury much of the year, the 31-year-old Dominican Republic native was examined hand specialist Dr. Thomas Graham on Monday and will have surgery sometime next week.

From the Blue Jays website:

"The only way I could have played again this year without having surgery was to do what we did. I tried, here's just too much instability in that tendon."

Perhaps Bautista could have toughed it out until the off-season to have surgery, but with the team mired at the bottom of the standings the surgery is the best route to take at this point.

The Dominican baseball player Bautista is a three-time All-Star and two-time Silver Slugger award winner. He is from Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

Jose Bautista, by Keith Allison on Flickr

2 Dominican players compete in 2012 MLB Home Run Derby

The 2012 MLB All-Star Game rosters feature 8 Dominican baseball players this year. That comes out to 11% of all the players appearing in the All-Star Game. The percentage of Dominican players appearing in the 2012 MLB Home Run Derby last night was smaller, but the country still had two representatives swing away in the Derby.

Dominican player Robinson Cano was shut out in the first round of the Home Run Derby. The Dominican Baseball Guy can not remember any player getting shut out in a Derby, so it must be a long time since that has happened. This proves once again that the Home Run Derby does not mean a lot. Cano is one of the top  5 players in the game by most accounts, and he will be in the running for the AL MVP again this year.

However, Jose Bautista salvaged the competition for fans of Dominican players. Bautista has led the AL in home runs the last two seasons and is a appearing in his second strait home run derby, so he was expected to have a good showing. He made it to the second round, then snuck into the finals in a bat off against Mark Trumbo, before finally losing in the finals to Prince Fielder.

Dominican baseball player Robinson Cano is from San Pedro de Macoris, Dominican Republic and Jose Bautista is from Santo Domingo.

Dominican beisbol player of the week: Robinson Cano

Robinson Cano has been hot. He almost won the Dominican Baseball Guy's Dominican Beisbol Player of the Week last week, but was the runner up to Aramis Ramirez.

Last week Cano had a better week than most players have in a career (.286, 4 HR, 5 RBI, 6 R). But this week he hit .414 (12-for-29) with four home runs and 10 RBIs in seven games. It was good enough for his sixth career American League Player of the Week honor, and his first career Dominican beisbol player of the week award.

Amazingly, these two hot weeks by Cano were not enough to win him the American League Player of the Month award, which he has already won 2 times. He was edged out in this award by fellow Dominican beisbol player Jose Bautista of the Blue Jays. Bautista had 14 home runs and 30 RBI in June, compared to Cano's 11 home runs and 21 RBI, though Cano did hit for a much higher average.

Yankees skipper Joe Girardi commented that he basically expects these types of performances by Cano on a consistent basis.

He is one of the best player in MLB and will contend for the MVP, as he has done for the last several years. So, the Dominican Baseball Guy agrees with Girardi. Expect to see more Dominican beisbol player of the week awards for Robinson Cano throughout the rest of the season as well.

Cano is from San Pedro de Macoris, Dominican Republic. Bautista and Ramirez are both from Santo Domingo, the Capital of the Dominican Republic.

Dominican beisbol player of the week Robinson Cano, by Keith Allison on Flickr

2012 MLB All-Star rosters feature 8 Dominican players

The 2012 MLB All-Star game roster were announced Sunday and there are eight Dominican players among the All-Star invitees.

Interesting that six out of the eight Dominican players featured in the All-Star game were voted in by the fans of starters. Out of 18 position starters on the NL and AL squad, that means that 33% of the starters in the All-Star game come from the Dominican Republic. This is a huge number, considering that 11% of MLB players are Dominican.

But, alas the overall number of total Dominicans on the 2012 MLB All-Star rosters is right at the percentage of Dominicans players in Major League Baseball. Eight of a total of around 70 players in the All-Star game are Dominican, which comes to 11%.

Four out of the nine position starters on the AL team are Dominican players, along with one pitcher:

• Robinson Cano is starting for the third strait time and making his fourth appearance overall. He is from San Pedro de Macoris, Republica Dominicana.
• Adrian Beltre is starting for the second strait year and is playing in his third strait All-Star game. Beltre is from the Dominican capital of Santo Domingo.
• Jose Bautista set the all-time votes record last year, only to have that record broken by Josh Hamilton this year.  He is from Santo Domingo too.
• David Ortiz is an All-Star for the eighth time, also from Santo Domingo.
• Fernando Rodney is from Samana, Dominican Republic and is playing in his first All-Star game.

There are two Dominican starters and one Dominican reserve player on the NL squad:

• Rafael Furcal made his third All-Star game in his thirteenth year in the bigs. Not surprising, considering he was named the Dominican Baseball Guy player of the week earlier this season. He is from Loma de Cabrera, Dominican Republic.
• Melky Cabrera is from Santo Domingo and is appearing in his first mid-summer classic.
• Starlin Castro will play in his second All-Star game in just his third big league season. He is from Monte Cristi, DR.

See all these top Dominican players and the rest of the MLB All-Stars July 10, 2012 on FOX.

Nobody has heard of Jose Bautista, huh? Jose Bautista es El mejor pelotero que nadia conoce?

So, according to Time magazine Jose Bautista is the "best baseball player you have never heard of."  Well I am the Dominican Baseball Guy so I am offended that anyone would not know who Bautista is.  And the readers of the Dominican Baseball Guy are highly knowledgeable fans that also know exactly who Jose Bautista is.

He led the AL in home runs last year and one the Silver Slugger Award.  He made his second strait all-star team this season.  He is from Santo Domingo, but went to Juco in the states before being drafted by the Pirates in 2000.  He made his major league debut in 2005 and was an everyday player with the Pirates and the Blue Jays from 06-09, with a career high of 15 home runs in a season.  And then POW, 54 home runs last year and 42 thus far this year.

Now the Dominican Baseball Guy knew all that and more just off the top of his head.  But Time makes some good points as to why the average Joe fan does not know this great player, mainly that he plays in Canada and for a bad team, the Blue Jays.

As the Dominican Baseball Guy mentions, Jose is from Santo Domingo.  He has one of the best twitter handles out there, so go follow him on twitter: @JoeyBats19

Jose Bautista warms up with Blue Jays, by Keith Allison on Flickr

Blue Jays Jose Bautista looking to continue success of last year

After a stellar 2010 season, Jose Bautista is clearly the leader of the Blue Jays this season.  The team is hoping he can continue to be a great leader, after proving himself one of the best players in the league last season.  The Blue Jays trust in Bautista is evidenced by the five year $65 million contract he signed during spring training.

Bautista, for his part, knows teams will be gunning to shut him down this season, and he is out to prove that last season was not an anomaly.  He is happy to have a regular position in the lineup this season, after bouncing around all over the batting order last season.  It will be hard to repeat his season from last year, as he won the Hank Aaron Award and was fourth in the AL MVP vote, but Bautista plans to play within himself and not pressure himself to hit a home run every time.

The Blue Jays have been one of the most active teams in signing Dominican talent, since they brought in George Bell and Tony Fernandez in the late 1990s.  Bautista is an anomaly among Dominican players in that he was a member of the Dominican middle class growing up, and he attended junior college in Florida before being drafted:

"I played on the street, I played with bottle caps, I played with rubber balls, tennis balls, real baseballs, but I never played on rocky infields like some of these kids that grew up outside of the city.  I was very privileged and fortunate that I was part of the Dominican Republic middle class, which is not very big. I was able to get a good education, go to a private Catholic school."

In any case he is another Dominican bone a fide big leaguer now, and already has two home runs through seven games this season.  He is from Santo Domingo, DR.

Jose Bautista, by Keith Allison on Flickr

David Ortiz Celebrity Golf Classic

The David Ortiz Celebrity Golf Classic is this weekend in Cap Cana, Dominican Republic.  Here is the official website.  The tournament proceeds fund the David Ortiz Children's Fund, which provides money for pediatric medical care in Boston and the Dominican Republic.  There are a slew of articles covering his charity golf tournament, many coming from Dominican publications (see this one).  This is a huge story in the Dominican Republic, as Ortiz is one of the most famous Dominican players.  The Boston Herald covered it as well and put out a few articles: one on Ortiz's future in Boston, one on Adrian Beltre and his contract opportunities for next year, and several blog posts from Cap Cana on their Extra Bases blog.

In attendance were Dustin Pedroia, Daniel Bard, Jon Lester, Darnell McDonald, Jed Lowrie, Tim Wakefield, Adrian Beltre, Johnny Damon, Pedro Martinez, Vlad Guerrero, Robbie Cano, Ubaldo Jimenez, Placido Polanco and Francisco Liriano.  Bill Russell, Jim Rice, and some other celeberities were there too.  Ortiz is of course the star though.  Here he is with Bobby Orr:

David Ortiz is not alone.  Lots of current and former Dominican players do charity work for their home country.  Jose Bautista is currently teaming with the NCAA to recruit Dominican student athletes.

Dominican Baseball Guy MLB 2010 All-Dominican Team

It is finally time for the Dominican Baseball Guy's prestigious All-Dominican team.  This is a yearly all-star team of the best Dominican players in the MLB for each season.  It is based on numbers, the year each player had, but also on who the Dominican Baseball Guy thinks is the best Dominican Player at each position.  So here is the 2010 MLB All-Dominican Team, as chosen by the Dominican Baseball Guy.

1B Albert Pujols: He did what he always does: .312, 42 HR, 118 RBI.  There is a reason they call this guy "la maquina" or "the machine."  He has hit .300 with 30+ HR and 100+ RBI in every year of his 10 year career.  Pujols has already won a Gold Glove and a Silver Slugger for 2010.  Pujols won the August Dominican Baseball Guy Player of the month and the NL Player of the Month Award.  He is from Santo Domingo, DR.


2B Robinson Cano: This was another easy choice for the Dominican Baseball Guy.  Like Pujols, Cano won both the Gold Glove and the Silver Slugger for 2B in the AL.  So, since he is the best fielder and hitter at his position, he obviously gets a spot on the All-Dominican Team for 2010.  He made the Sporting News post season All-Star team at 2B too.  Cano won the AL Player of the Month for April.  Cano is from San Pedro de Macoris, DR.





SS Hanley Ramirez: Hanley had a self-admited down year, but he still hit .300 with 21 home runs and 76 RBI.  The Dominican Baseball guy is no sure how this guy does not have 100 RBI every year.  He won the Home Run Derby, after which the Dominican Baseball Guy tabbed him as the "sweetest swing in the game."  He has already won the Sporting News NL SS of the year award.  Hanley is from Samana, DR.






3B Adrian Beltre: Adrian won the AL Silver Slugger award for third base.  He has been in the big leagues for 13 years and had perhaps his best year at the plate this year with the Red Sox (.321, 28HR, 102 RBI).  He was the Dominican Baseball Guy June 2010 Player of the Month.  Beltre is from Santo Domingo, DR.

OF Jose Bautista:  Bautista led the MLB with 54 HR and was third in RBI with 124.  He won an AL Silver Slugger and the Hank Aaron award for the top hitter in the AL.  He won the Dominican Baseball Guy Dominican Player of the Month, and the AL Player of the Month for July and August.  Another obvious choice for the All-Dominican Team.  He is from Santo Domingo, DR.

OF Nelson Cruz: So, Nelson only had 22 HR and 78 RBI this year, but he only played in 108 games.  The Dominican Baseball Guy thinks he showed his true form in the playoffs, setting an all-time record for extra-base hits in the playoffs.  If he can stay healthy he will be an All-Star for many years to come.  Cruz is from Monte Cristi, DR.


OF Vladimir Guerrero: OK, Vlad only played a handful of games in the outfield this season.  But the Dominican Baseball Guy did not see any other Dominicans that warranted receiving this prestigious award for this season.  Vlad had an incredible year too (29 HR, 115 RBI, .300).  He is a lifetime .320 hitter, which is 5th on the active list and 54th all-time.  This from a guy that is seen as a power hitter.  One of the Dominican Baseball Guy's favorite players ever, he is from Nizao, DR.

Starting Pitcher Ubaldo Jimenez: Ubaldo got off to a great start and won the NL Pitcher of the Month for April and May.  He was 15-1 at the All-Star break.  He slowed down later in the season, but still finished 19-8 with a 2.88 ERA in 220 innings.  According to this article he is still in a 4 way race for NL Cy Young.

Relief Pitchers Rafael Soriano and Carlos Marmol: Soriano was 3rd in the MLB in saves with 45.  He won the Delivery Man of the Month Award three times this year and The Dominican Baseball Guy Pitcher of the Month award once.  Marmol won the Delivery Man of the Month award once, was 7th in the MLB in saves, and set an MLB record with 15.99 Ks per 9 innings.  Rafael is from San Jose, DR and Carlos is from Bonao, DR.

Rookie Neftali Feliz: Neftali tied for fifth in MLB in saves and set a rookie record with 40 saves.  He won the AL Rookie of the Year award already, so he is surely the top Dominican rookie this season.  Neftali is from Azua, DR.

Notice there are no catchers on the All-Dominican team.  The Dominican Baseball Guy has noticed a strange trend: there are very few Dominican catchers at any level.  The Dominican Baseball Guy does not know of any Dominican catchers in the big leagues, and even in the Dominican Winter Baseball League, a lot for the catchers are imports.  Other than this lack of a catcher, this All-Dominican team has an All-Star or someone that could play for any big league team at every position.  It would be a pretty successful club if they were to all play together.  Not sure how they keep managing to do so bad in the World Baseball Classic.

Dominican MLB 2010 Players of the Month

The Dominican Baseball Guy awarded monthly winners for the top Dominican player and pitcher in the MLB throughout the 2010 season.  These are based solely on the Dominican Baseball Guy's opinion as to which Dominican players had the best month.  Here are the winners throughout the season:

May: Ubaldo Jimenez and Vladimir Guerrero
June: Neftali Feliz and Adrian Beltre
July: Rafael Soriano and Jose Bautista
August: Wandy Rodriguez and Albert Pujols/Jose Bautista
September: Carlos Marmol and Pedro Alvarez

A number of Dominicans also won the official player of the month award for the NL and AL during the 2010 MLB season.  Here is the list of Dominicans that won these awards:

NL Pitcher of the Month (April and May): Ubaldo Jimenez
NL Player of the Month (August): Albert Pujols
NL Rookie of the Month (September): Pedro Alvarez
AL Pitcher of the Month (April): Francisco Liriano
AL Player of the Month (April): Robinson Cano
AL Player of the Month (May): David Ortiz
AL Player of the Month (July and August): Jose Bautista
AL Rookie of the Month (September): Neftali Feliz

Pretty incredible that Dominicans won 10 of the 37 player of the month awards on the year.  This from a country of 10 million people.

Look for the Dominican Baseball Guy's prestigious 2010 All-Dominican team to come out soon.

Dominican MLB September 2010 Players of the Month

The Dominican Player of the Month for September could easily go to one of the co-players of the month for August, Albert Pujols or Jose Bautista.  Both had huge months yet again, and Bautista received voted for the AL Player of the Month (see the MLB press release).  So consider them runners up for the Dominican Baseball Guy Dominican Player of the Month for September 2010.

But the Dominican Baseball is going with an little known Dominican for the Dominican Player of the Month for September.  And the award goes to Pedro Alvarez, of the Pittsburg Pirates.  The Dominican Baseball Guy knows, few of you have heard of him...and he plays for the Pirates.  But he had a huge September.  Over the last 30 days of the regular season he had 5 HRs, 24 RBIs, and hit .320.  And he is a rookie, and may still have his rookie eligibility for next year, though the Dominican Baseball Guy is not sure on this.  He did play in 95 games this year, and made it to the big leagues after just two plus years in the minors.  He actually went to Vanderbilt, which is not the most common route to the big leagues for Dominican Prospects.  He did not have the best year in the 95 games he did play, but was hot in September and maybe he has a more consistent year next year.  Pedro is from Santo Domingo, DR.

The Dominican Pitcher of the Month for September 2010 was an easier choice.  Carlos Marmol of the Cubs won the MLB Delivery Man of the Month award (see MLB press release), and he is the Dominican Baseball Guy's Dominican Pitcher of the Month for September 2010.  In September he was 13 for 13 in saves and did not allow a single run.  He finished the season with an MLB record 16K/9 innings.  Carlos is from Bonao, DR and has been in the big leagues for 5 seasons, but just became the everyday closer for the Cubs this year.  He has an interesting side arm style on some pitches that you can kind of see in this picture:

Dominican Baseball Card #3: George Bell

The latest Dominican Baseball Guy Dominican Baseball Card is a 1990 Score #286 George Bell card.  Toronto Blue Jays fans remember George Bell fondly I am sure.  The Dominican Baseball Guy decided to scan the front and back of this card, because these Score cards have cool insert pictures on the back.  Of course, you can see his full stats at George Bell's Baseball Cube page since it is kind of hard to see the stats here.  Bell did this before steroids came around when it was actually an amazing incredible feat to have 47 HRs and 134 RBI in a season.  George won the AL MVP for this season, and he was the first Dominican to win an MVP award.  He played for nine years that were all super productive (seven with Toronto, 1 with the Cubs, and 1.5 with the White Sox).  Bell is a member of the Rogers Centre's Level of Excellence, the Blue Jays Hall of Fame.

 

Bell has been in the news lately because the Dominican Baseball Guy's Dominican Player of the Month, Jose Bautista, just broke his Blue Jays single season home run record that was set in that 1987 season.  Mark Zwolinski of the Toronto Star interviewed Bell for this article, and David Perkins of the Star wrote this article after Bautista broke the record.  Bell has been following Bautista and says that Bautista is one of his favorite players.  He is happy that a fellow Dominican is breaking his record, and says that everyone in the DR is following him:

“They love what Jose is doing. They’ve always had the older guys like (Albert) Pujols, and Pedro Martinez, but Jose is running away with the home-run lead and he’s close to breaking (Bell’s Jays record). A lot of people are talking about it here.”

This is typical in the DR.  Everyone wants to see the Dominicans playing in the big leagues and hopes that they do well.  Dominicans root for their fellow Dominicans above all else.

George Bell now owns a construction company in his home town, the Mecca of baseball, San Pedro de Macoris, DR.  He is also an avid golfer, has a 1 handicap, and plays lots of golf in the DR and throughout the US.  He still has family in Boston and splits time between the DR and the US, as it is only a 2 hour flight or so to Florida or the northeast coast.  Congrats George on a great career and life!

The Dominican Baseball Guy has so many Dominican Baseball cards that he is going to start doing a Dominican baseball card post 3 times a month, on the 10th, 20th, and 30th of every month.

Dominican MLB August 2010 Players of the Month

Wow, this is gonna sound like "Groundhog Day," and there are going to be a couple of obvious choices for the prestigious Dominican Baseball Guy all-Dominican Team that will be announced at the end of the year.  But any time a Dominican wins one of the league player of the month or pitcher of the month awards, it is going to be hard for the Dominican Baseball Guy to give the Dominican player of the month award to another Dominican.

For the first time, there are co-Dominican Players of the Month.  Albert "Winnie the" Pujols won the NL Player of the Month for August and Jose Bautista won the AL award.  As the Dominican Baseball Guy has said before on this previous post, fullpitchcount.com has the best recap of the MLB players of the month.  Albert had another crazy month (.379, 11 HRs, 23 RBI) on the way to winning his 5th NL Player of the Month Award.  Jose Bautista won the AL award for the 2nd strait month with 12 HRs and 24 RBI.  He is the first Dominican to win the Dominican Baseball Guy's Dominican Player of the Month Award 2 months in a row.  Albert and Jose are both from the capital of the DR, Santo Domingo.

Even though Rafael Soriano won the MLB Delivery Man of the Month Award, and could certainly be given the Dominican Pitcher of the Month Award for a second strait month, the Dominican Pitcher of the Month goes to Wandy Rodriguez.  Wandy is a starter for the Dominican Baseball Guy's hometown Houston Astros and has pitched well for years.  He is an inning eater and has had an ERA hovering in the 3.00 range, while pitching around 200 innings the last two years.  Wandy received votes for the NL Pitcher of the Month Award and actually had the best overall numbers out of any NL Pitcher, other than the win-loss (2-1, 1.34, 43 SO, 40.1 IP).  But he plays for the Astros so what can he do.  Wandy is from Santiago, DR.

 

 Gotta love the Astros 1980's Nolan Ryan Era throwback jerseys.

Dominican MLB July 2010 Players of the Month

The Dominican Baseball Guy's Dominican Player of the Month for July 2010 was not a very hard choice.  Jose Bautista shared the AL Player of the month with Delmon Young, so Jose Bautista is the Dominican Baseball Guy Dominican Player of the Month for July 2010.   

Here is the MLB.com press release for the AL July player of the month.  Bautista has had a breakout year for the Blue Jays.  According to another article from the Blue Jays official website: 

In July, Bautista hit .347 with 11 home runs and 29 RBIs. His 11 homers were the most in the Major Leagues for the month and his 19 extra-base hits were tied for the most in baseball. Bautista led the American League with a .765 slugging percentage as well.

This is the second time Bautista has led Majors in home runs (12 in May).  He is currently leading the Majors in home runs with 36, and is third in RBI with 88.  Looks like he is on his way to a coveted spot on the Dominican Baseball Guy's all-Dominican Team at the end of the year.  Jose is from Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

The Dominican Baseball Guy Dominican Pitcher of the Month for July 2010 goes to Rafael Soriano.  Soriano has a 1.77 ERA with 33 saves on the season as the Tampa Bay Rays everyday closer.  He had 11 saves in July and received some votes for the July 2010 AL Pitcher of the month.  Rafael is from San Jose, DR.

On a side note, Wilson Betemit, who won a Dominican Winter League player of the week award last season (as the Dominican Baseball Guy blogged), won the Kansas City Royals player of the Month Award.  Wilson is from Santo Dominigo as well.

All Star Game

The Dominican Baseball Guy hoped to blog about the All Star game, but there really is not much to say.  Most of the Dominicans were shut out.  Here is the yahoo sports recap if anyone is interested.

Hanley Ramirez, Rafael Furcal, Albert Pujols, Jose Bautista, Vladimir Guerrero, Adrian Beltre, and Robinson Cano were all hitless.  David Ortiz had 1 hit.  Jose Reyes did not play because he was injured.  So, the Dominicans were 1-12 on the night.

The Dominican pitchers fared a little better.  Ubaldo Jimenez pitched two scoreless innings to start the game for the NL.  Rafael Soriano and Jose Valverde each pitched a scoreless inning for the AL.  Neftali Feliz, and Fausto Carmona did not get to pitch.

So the Dominican Baseball Guy is sad to report that not much happened with the Dominicans in the All Star game this year.  But they did have 14 Dominicans selected to the game and David Ortiz and Hanley Ramirez put on a great show the night before in the Home Run Derby, as the Dominican Baseball Guy says in his previous post.

Dominicans in 2010 MLB (Update #2)

There is a lot going on with Dominican Players in MLB right now.  This is an obvious fact since there were around 80 Dominicans on opening day rosters.  This number will fluctuate throughout the season as players are called up to the big show, or sent down to the minors, but the Dominican Baseball Guy thinks there should be at least 80 Dominicans in the big leagues all year.  So, some of these Dominicans will surely continue to make news.

Ubaldo Jimenez and Francisco Liriano continue to pitch well as starters, as the Dominican Baseball Guy stated a few posts back.  Jimenez is definitely a front runner for National League Cy Young at this point.

Vladimir Guerrero is playing very well for the Rangers.  He is in the top 10 in the American League in average and RBI right now.  Guerrero has long been a favorite player of the Dominican Baseball Guy.  He is a .322 lifetime hitter, an incredible lifetime average for someone that also hits for power.  He was the AL MVP in 2004 and has 4 Silver Slugger awards.  He also has a great arm in the outfield and the Dominican Baseball Guy has seen him throw out many runners from right field.  He had a walk off hit a few days ago too.

Alfonso Soriano and Robinson Cano are also off to good starts.  They are both from San Pedro de Macoris, the city highlighted in the new book, The Eastern Stars: How Baseball Changed the Dominican Town of San Pedro de Macoris.

Jose Bautista has played well for the Blue Jays.  Albert Pujols is doing his normal thing, batting like 1.000 with runners in scoring position and churning out his normal triple crown contending numbers.  Jose Guillen and Nelson Cruz have hit well, although Nelson Cruz has been injured some.

Interesting that the Dominican Baseball Guy does not mention some of the most famous Dominican ballplayers like Pedro Martinez and David Ortiz.  There is a new crop of Dominicans playing in MLB and there will be another group behind them, as there are no shortage of Dominican prospects in the minor leagues.