Indios de Mayagüez

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Indios de Mayagüez

League

LBPPR

Location

Mayagüez, Puerto Rico

Ballpark

TBD, formerly played at Isidoro García Baseball Stadium

Year Founded

1938

League championships

1949, 1957, 1963, 1966, 1978, 1984, 1986, 1988, 1989, 1992, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2003, 2005

Caribbean World Series championships

1978, 1992

Uniforms






Home






Away

The Indios de Mayagüez (English: Mayagüez Indians) are a baseball team in the Puerto Rican Professional Baseball League (LBPPR, in Spanish). Based in Mayagüez, the Indios have won 15 national championships and two Caribbean World Series. It is one of four teams remaining from the original six incorporated into the LBPPR at its founding in 1938.

The Indios were named after the Cervecería India (the local brewery, and its formal sponsor over most of the team's 68-year run) besides the fact that Mayagüez, located at the western coast of Puerto Rico, has a strong indigenous heritage, starting with the city's name (which is derived from the Taino language). The team's colors are burgundy red and gold, which at one time were the colors on the label of Cerveza India, the original flagship product of the brewery. The Cervecería India's current flagship product, Cerveza Medalla Light, is now the team's official endorser.

The Indios de Mayagüez team is, at the time of writing (January 2007) the team with the most championship wins in LBPPR history. At a time when most Puerto Rican cities and towns are better known for their support of basketball or volleyball teams, the city of Mayagüez remains as a strong baseball stronghold in the island nation. The team's fan base has a reputation for loyalty bordering in the extreme, and average game attendance by Indios fans has been consistently high (and at times the highest) in the Puerto Rico winter league during recent seasons.

At any given year -should the Indios make it to the LBPPR tournament playoffs- assistance to the team's baseball park and post-game celebrations tend to be particularly high due to the fact that they usually coincide with the celebration of the patron saint feasts (fiestas patronales) for the city of Mayagüez; it is not unusual for a championship game to coincide with Candlemas (2 February) or Candlemas Eve.

The Indios' management team is led by its owner, Daniel Aquino Méndez and its general manager, Carlos Pieve Marín. Dan Rohn is the team's manager as of the 2006-2007 season.

[edit] History

[edit] The early years

Mayagüez had a semi-professional baseball team prior to 1938, which played at a municipal baseball park (now called the Santiago Lloréns Baseball Field) located at the Paris barrio of the city. Once the LBPPR was created, the Mayagüez team became a part of it. A management team led by Alfonso Valdés Cobián owned the team during its initial years.

The Indios won their first LBPPR championship in 1949. The team moved from their previous grounds to then-new Isidoro García Baseball Stadium, located near the southwest corner of the city, later that year.

[edit] The Babel Pérez era

Babel Pérez assumed the management of the Indios after Alfonso Valdés. The Indios won two championships under his helm, in 1963 and 1967. Joe Christopher was a major player for the Indios during the period^[1].

Pérez died suddenly in Bamberg, Germany in 1971, while traveling on a religious pilgrimage. A committee of local businessmen took charge of the team from then on until 1977.

[edit] The Luis Gómez Monagas era

A new management team lead by Luis Gómez Monagas, a successful insurance businessman (and later one-time father-in-law of Colombian actor and folk singer Carlos Vives) bought the Indios in 1974. At the time, the Indios had had a dry spell, having earned only two championships in more than 15 years and consistently ending in last place in every LBPPR tournament since Pérez's passing. To make matters worse, the Isidoro García baseball stadium was in such state of disrepair that it was literally unsafe for fans, players and field keepers.

[edit] The historic 1977-1978 team

The 1977-1978 team literally saved the franchise from bankrupcy and oblivion. Managed by Rene Lacheman, and provided with a powerful lineup that featured Ron LeFlore, Jim Dwyer, Kurt Bevacqua and José Manuel Morales in the 1-4 spots, the team barely made it to the playoffs, to consequently sweep the semi-final and final series. The final game for the series had Mayagüez beat the coincidentally named Bayamón Cowboys with a score of 18-2. The team eventually made it to Mazatlán, Mexico, where it won the 1978 Caribbean World Series.

This was a turning point in the team's history. Fan support gave the Indios' management team enough financial solvency to save the franchise. From winning only three championships in 40 years, the team went on to win 12 championships in the 28 years following the 1978 season. Collective fan protests demanded repairs to the baseball stadium from its owner, the then-named Parks and Leisure Administration of Puerto Rico (now called the Puerto Rico Department of Recreation and Sports), a government agency that still owns and controls the facility despite offers from the municipality of Mayagüez to purchase or maintain it. The stadium was remodeled soon after (1980).

[edit] The Luis Iván Méndez era

Health reasons forced Gómez to sell ownership of the team to Luis Iván Méndez, a former color commentator for the team's radio broadcasts. This was a controversial move, since Méndez's extreme passion for the team was viewed with skepticism by some local fans, who considered him to be brash, arrogant, and motivated chiefly by money. As a broadcaster, Méndez had been a devil's advocate during the team's lean years, providing much necessary feedback to improve its lineup, but his comments were rather blunt at times, something that alienated team fans (he was even confrontational with a few of them). The fact that Méndez was the first non-native of the city to own the team (Méndez is a native of nearby San Sebastián, Puerto Rico) did not help. Some fans even suspected Méndez of wanting to move the team to his hometown, which had a successful AA League franchise.

Objectively, though, Méndez not only attempted to raise fan support to a near-religious status, but was also responsible for five championships and three runner-up spots. He was responsible for establishing or endorsing many team rituals, changing the team's colors to burgundy and gold, and even demanding that the Indios wear their own uniform (and not wear one with the name "Puerto Rico") when going to the Caribbean World Series. Many fans decided to have a love-hate relationship with Méndez, praising his business smarts and baseball acumen while hating him personally.

[edit] The Daniel Aquino era

Méndez, who had grown tired of public criticism against him (and who faced a suspension from the LBPPR for assaulting a league peer), sold ownership of the team to Daniel Aquino, a native of the Dominican Republic who had earned a Mechanical Engineering degree from the nearby University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez. The fans' reaction to Aquino, who was once the owner of the Leones del Escogido of the Dominican winter league, made the backlash against Méndez pale in comparison. Aquino had experienced considerable criticism in his home country for "watering down" the Leones' roster due to escalating payroll costs. Xenophobia played a role in criticism against Aquino, who repeatedly countered by saying that he had strong personal ties to Puerto Rico and Mayagüez, and that after his experience with the Leones' he had realized that he would not jump into managing any other baseball team if he didn't have a personal take on the team's outcome.

However, Aquino has proved to be a successful owner, helped in part by the inclusion of yet another controversial (and very vocal) baseball executive, Carlos Pieve, to his management team (this time as general manager). Aquino's first year as owner had the Indios win a league championship (2003), only to have them end up last the following year (2004), and subsequently win yet another championship the next year (2005). The team lost the 2006 final series against the Gigantes de Carolina and lost again against the team in the semifinal round of the 2007 playoffs.

[edit] Cultural ties to Mayagüez

The Indios are mentioned in what is recognized as the unofficial city song, Cesar Concepcion's plena "A Mayagüez". Plena singer Mon Rivera was the team's bat boy and eventually its shortstop. Sports broadcaster Johnny Flores Monge is also a former bat boy.

[edit] Celebrity fans

Carlos Vives
Jose Serrano - has a Mayagüez baseball cap on his desk at the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C.

[edit] Best known former MLB players

Major League Baseball players who played with the Indios include Tommy Lasorda, Ron LeFlore, Kurt Bevacqua, Dennis Martinez, Roberto Hernandez and Wally Joyner.

Local MLB stars who were also part of the Indios are Wil Cordero and Jose Vidro. Cordero was raised at the Cócora section of town, across the street from Isidoro García Baseball Stadium.

[edit] LBPPR Championships (team managers)

1948-1949: Artie Wilson
1956-1957: Mickey Owen
1962-1963: Cal Ermer
1965-1966: Wayne C. Blackburn
1977-1978: Rene Lacheman
1983-1984: Frank Verdi
1985-1986: Nick Leyva
1987-1988: Jim Riggleman
1988-1989: Tom Gamboa
1991-1992: Pat Kelly
1996-1997: Tom Gamboa
1997-1998: Tom Gamboa
1998-1999: Al Newman
2002-2003: Nick Leyva
2004-2005: "Mako" (Max) Oliveras

[edit] The Mayagüez All-Time All-Star Team

On December 2003 a panel of five local sport newscasters announced their picks for an all-time Indios de Mayagüez All-Time All Star Team. This selection considered candidates from Indios teams from the previous 65 years. Their selected team lists as follows:

Denny McLain, P (RH)
Dave McNally, P (LH)
Lance Parrish, C
Brian Johnson, C
Wally Joyner, 1B
Carlos Manuel Santiago^[2], 2B
Artie Wilson^[3], SS
Kurt Bevacqua, 3B
Wilmer Fields, 3B (sometimes P, 1B)
Jim Dwyer, LF
Jim Northrup, CF
Luis A. "Canena" Márquez, RF
Lucius "Luke" Easter, DB

[edit] Retired Numbers

4 - Humberto "Pita" Martí, C
13 - Ceferino "Cefo" Conde, P
21 - Roberto Clemente Walker (retired from all LBPPR teams), RF
23 - Luis "Mambo" de León, P

[edit] Indios iconography and traditions

[edit] Theme song

The unofficial team song is a merengue named "¡Ahí vienen los Indios!", a song written and performed by Dominican merengue bandleaders Damirón y Chapuseaux in the early 1950's. Seemingly unrelated to the team itself, its chorus' lyrics are rather simple: "Ahí vienen los indios, corre Manuel... / con el hacha en la mano" ("There come the indians, Manuel, run (away).../with a hatchet in their hands"). It raises the stereotype of the angry indigenous natives ("indians") who are adamant to scalp the song's subject, Manuel, should they get their hands on him.

A more fitting (but still unofficial) team song is the plena "El Mayagüez Invencible", whose author is unknown, but which is generally attributed to Cefo Conde, a baseball player (and baseball philosopher) who played for multiple LBPPR teams, and who was instrumental to the Indios' first championship win in 1949. The plena names every single Mayagüez player in the 1949 team's initial lineup, along with their playing position. Its lyrics have been updated for the occasional team championship win, but since its musical structure is rather complex, it is not as popular as the Damirón y Chapuseaux song.

[edit] Los Indios de mi pueblo

Ramón S. Olivencia, a long-time news anchorman for various Puerto Rican news radio stations, and who was born in Mayagüez, made a habit of mentioning "Los Indios de mi pueblo" ("My hometown's Indians") instead of reading the team's name, whenever he had to read baseball scores from the previous night on his broadcasts. The phrase stuck and it is still in common use, long after Olivencia's passing. It is usually the reference in use by native "mayagüezanos" when referring to the team.

[edit] AVC initials

The Indios de Mayagüez were initially sponsored by the local Cervecería India, founded in 1938 by local businessman Alfonso Valdés Cobián. After Valdés' passing, the initials "AVC" were permanently added to the left sleeve of all team uniforms, in honor of the team's first owner.

[edit] La Sonora del Bacalao

A sonora is a traditional Cuban musical band lineup featuring four trumpets. The "Codfish Sonora", however, is an impromptu plena group that forms at Indios' home games, particularly if and when Mayagüez reaches the playoffs of the LBPPR tournament. It usually features no trumpets, but may have a single brass player (usually a lone trumpet), or even a full trombanga (trombone lineup, called the "Mayagüez Sound" by some) depending on the importance of the game being played. It also features a full plena percussion section.

The Sonora gets its name from their most frequently played musical number: a variation on the Chano Pozo composition "La Comparsa de los Dandys" (with which Pozo earned the first prize of the Santiago de Cuba carnival in 1940). The Sonora replaces the original chorus of the song with: "¡Oye (blank), tu tienes una peste encima / Fó, fó, a bacalao!" (Hey -blank- you have this funky smell / Phew, phew, you smell of codfish!). The blank part is usually replaced with the visiting team's name, or the name of any of its players. The song is usually played whenever the Indios are trouncing the opposing team or the visitors have had a stream of errors or flawed defensive plays.

Another Sonora del Bacalao "hit" is a plena version of Mexican standard Cielito Lindo.

The core group of La Sonora has accompanied the Indios outside of Puerto Rico on at least two Caribbean World Series championships.

[edit] The Indio de Mayagüez cheerleader

Since the late 1970s, and well into the early 2000s, the "Indio de Mayagüez" character has become an unofficial cheerleader of the team. The Indio is namely a costumed fan wearing a woolen poncho and feathered headdress who demands cheers from the audience for the local team and boos for the visitors. The Indio then finishes his session by placing a handkerchief (or a banner borrowed from a fan) on one side of the Indios dugout's roof, walking to the opposite side, and then running and sliding towards the handkerchief to pick it up head-first, as if he were stealing a base^[4].

At one time during the late 1990s, the cheerleader sled past the dugout's roof and landed on a nearby staircase, fracturing a leg and three ribs. After a long convalescence, the Indio returned to his usual chanting grounds on top of the stadium's first base dugout, calling for cheers wearing a cast and crutches. At times the Indio is allowed into the infield, runs the bases, and steals home plate.

[edit] Radio broadcasts

The Indios de Mayagüez radio broadcast crew has had one constant member during the last twenty-nine years (as of 2007), radio announcer Arturo Soto Cardona. A native of nearby San Sebastián, Puerto Rico, Soto's has been narrating Indios' games since 1977.

Fiercely territorial as some Indios fans are, a common practice for many of them is to turn the volume down on television broadcasts featuring the Indios, and turning a radio set on to the official Indios radio broadcast, which is aired on local station WAEL-AM (600 kHz) and various other repeater stations along the western and southern coasts of the island. Soto's vocal inflections are so well recognized by fans that by just listening to his voice many can identify the difference between a pop-up fly and a hit before the ball actually lands.

A former member of the broadcast team, commercial spot coordinator David Castro had a reputation for having attended all Indios games home and abroad (except for one non-local game during the early 1960s) since the team's inception in 1938 until his retirement in 2005.