Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 1680: Díganos de Dihigo

Episode Date: April 13, 2021

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Joe Musgrove‘s no-hitter and the significance of Musgrove snapping the Padres’ no-no-no streak, Tim Locastro breaking Tim Raines’s record for the most consecutive successful steal attempts to start a career, Ronald Acuña Jr. beating out a routine grounder and MLB’s “FieldVision” depiction of the play, the controversial call […]

I'm glad we've tried Let the slide into harm's way I'm not concerned to ride it out There's no surprise that it's a long, slow fade Hello and welcome to episode 1680 of Effectively Wild, a Fangraphs baseball podcast brought to you by our Patreon supporters. I'm Meg Rowley of Fangraphs, and I am joined as always by Ben Lindberg of The Ringer. Ben, how are you? Well, I just got my first Pfizer jab, so I'm feeling pretty good. Oh, that makes me so happy. That's great. And you're feeling all right?

Yeah, so far. It literally just happened. So if there are side effects, they probably haven't had time to take effect, but I'll take whatever's coming to me because it's worth it. Yeah, for sure. So you haven't sprouted wings or? No, but like you, I found it to be a pretty uplifting activity. I think I'm not a church goer, but there were some similarities in this situation. It was sort of this hushed congregation. People were filing in to receive their offerings, seeking some sort of salvation. There is a sense of gratitude and shared purpose, and I felt good about it. I'm riding sort of a secular science high from the whole experience. Yeah, we goof up a lot of stuff, but we occasionally can come together and achieve pretty cool things. So it is a very nice moment after a very long and hard year.

Here's a segue. Joe Musgrove achieved a pretty cool thing. On Saturday, Joe Musgrove pitched the first no-hitter in San Diego Padres history. And I caught the last couple innings, and it was a pretty good time. He looked great. He's looked great all year. He was sort of a popular breakout pick, but it was one of those cases where like, are we sure he's still eligible to be a breakout pick? Because he's already been a pretty good pitcher, but it was kind of a combination of maybe underperforming his peripherals

last season and then leaving the Pirates. So any pitcher who leaves the Pirates is just automatically a breakout pick now. So he's had 15 scoreless innings to start this season, I think 31 scoreless consecutive innings dating back to last season. And he looked nasty even in the late innings, even as he was trying to hold it so that he didn't have to go to the bathroom. And as he was feeling fatigued and throwing a lot fewer fastballs, which I guess he's doing just in general these days, but he looked great and it's quite an achievement for the franchise. Yeah, it's, you know, no-hitters always have an element of luck, and they're, you know, they're good defensive plays that keep it moving.

And so I think we've maybe gone too far in the direction of thinking that the luck undermines it somewhat, that the perfect game is where it's at, and no hitters are a dime a dozen. And I would submit that maybe that's true to some extent, but when you're watching a franchise complete its first one and you can see the guys getting excited about it it's a really cool thing and you know we've talked about on this show how my my prior for musgrove needed updating because my strongest memories of him are when he was with houston and his performance was up and down then he had really dominant stretches he had less good stretches and then he he disappeared into the void that is pittsburgh and i just didn't watch very much of him over the years. And so I assume that he heard that and was like, well, let me show you what I'm up to, Meg. And so far, I gotta say, I'm pretty impressed. Yeah, there were a few defensive plays that helped him out, as there always are. But he was one hit by pitch away from the perfect game.

He looked great. And I kind of wonder, like, he was sort of overshadowed by the fact that they traded for Blake Snell and Hugh Darvish before they picked up Musgrove. And it's that it was just like a bonus that they got Musgrove. But he's looked so good that I wonder if he'll end up being one of the best two of the three that they acquired. And just like looking ahead to next year when Mike Clevenger is back and then you've got Darvish, Snell, Clevenger, Musgrove, and then whoever, I don't know, Gore or Lumet if he's healthy or Paddock or Morajon. It's just like a cornucopia of starting pitchers. So it's cool for the franchise, especially like, yeah, I mean, not every no-hitter is amazing. It's not always a sterling pitching performance. And sometimes it just, you know, they blend together. But in this case, when it breaks a

streak of, I think, 8,206 regular season games without a no-hitter, it just, it seems sort of symbolic. A, it was nice to have a San Diego native local kid be the first one. But also just like the fact that the Padres, in addition to their mediocrity over the years and their lack of star power, except for a couple guys really in their whole history, and their failure to win a World Series in 50 plus seasons. Now, the fact that in addition to all of that, they were also so late to getting a no-hitter and getting even a cycle, which we care about cycles even less than we care about no-hitters, but it just seems sort of symbolic that not until I think it was 2015 when Matt Kemp finally cycled for the Padres. At that point, they were the only team without a cycle, except for I think the Marlins, who haven't been around nearly as long and they have since cycled.

So the fact that it took them forever to get a cycle and then it took them forever to get a no-hitter, the only franchise remaining without one, it just seemed like part of the whole Padres-ness of just like, they're not very good. They're forgettable. They kind of blend into the background. And this team does not blend into the background. Even with Fernando Tatis on the shelf for hopefully not too much longer. But it's just such a good team and a fun team and an exciting team. And that just kind of seemed like it made it official. It's like, okay, these are not the old Padres who everyone just forgot about because they didn't win and they didn't have standout individual game performances.

Now they do all those things and they also win and they're great. So it means more in this specific case. They're like, Padres fans are going to hate this analogy. I don't like it either because they're yucky bugs. They're like cicadas. They're emerging. But I think that their lifespan as a good team is probably a little bit longer than those gross bugs. They're very gross.

So in that respect, this is terrible. And I apologize to everyone in San Diego, but you're a beautiful butterfly you are emerging into your beautiful form and uh and you know beautiful uniforms yeah you're you're you're flapping your you're flapping a lot of butterflies do have brown and yellow wings see that's much better i appreciate this little live edit it's really useful ben see even editors they need editors right so there was also a little more history that was set this weekend

where Tim Lacastro, Diamondbacks outfielder, set a major league record by stealing the 28th base of his career. He has not yet been caught, and we talked about this a little bit on the Diamondbacks preview episode, but he passed Tim Raines, who went 27 for 27

to start his career. LoCastro now has the most consecutive successful steal attempts to start a career. And there's actually a cool connection between LoCastro and Raines. Several years ago, LoCastro was a minor leaguer in the Blue Jays system, and Tim Raines was the Blue Jays' roving base running coach. So Raines actually helped teach the kid who would one day break his record. And LeCastro, probably not a future Hall of Famer like Reigns. He's had kind of an under-the-radar but fun career. He's one of the fastest players in the majors.

He's like at the top of the sprint speed leaderboard every year. He gets hit by a lot of pitches. And so it's this combination of getting plunked and then getting on base and being dangerous once he's there. And so it's this combination of getting plunked and then getting on base and being dangerous once he's there. And this is a cool accomplishment. It's obviously just related to the fact that he's super fast, but it's more than that too. Clearly he has the instincts. He has the knack for base stealing. Devin Fink wrote about this for Van Graffs, as you know, and he talked about how he picks his spots and doesn't really try to steal third very often,

maybe because he doesn't want to get caught, but maybe also because he can score from second on any hit. And he seems to pick his spots against catchers who are less likely to throw him out, but then probably everyone does that. Anyway, it's a fun thing when someone is really fast and also has the base stealing skills. Because I remember when we all were super excited about Billy Hamilton and how could anyone ever catch him because you just look at like, okay, pop times take this long. It takes X seconds for the ball to get there. And it takes this long for the ball to get to home plate. And he is this fast. So how could they ever catch him? It seems impossible. And yet they did. He gets caught fairly often. Could they ever catch him?

It seems impossible. And yet they did. Like he gets caught fairly often. I mean, he's, you know, he's got a good success rate, but it's not otherworldly. And so Castro's streak is pretty impressive and fun. I think that, you know, stolen bases get kind of a bad rap. I think this is a place where, you know, analytics has taken some of the wind out of the game's sails. Because, you know, we know where the break-even point is, and as a result of that, teams just try to steal less often.

And I think that because we kind of ran base stealing through the efficiency mill, fans were maybe left with the impression that all you had to be was blazing fast. And I think that it it really does a disservice to like the very good base dealers to not appreciate the the full multitude of that skill and sort of the breadth of that skill and so yeah I really like it when we have a a player who helps to illustrate that so dramatically where you can really appreciate that you know you can't just be fast like there is strategy to it and you have to, you know, you have to time your jumps

right and you have to get the right lead off base. And I don't know. I just think that, I think that my, one of my 2021 bits is going to be just arguing for more base stealing generally, because it makes me happy and there's a lot less of it than, than there used to be. And so when we can, when we can look at it and say that there is more than, it is a multi-dimensional, multi-faceted skill. I think that's a good thing. So I'm glad that we have a good example of that.

Yeah. And LoCastro actually tries to steal fairly often by today's standards. Devin said in his piece that he's in the 94th percentile when it comes to attempting steals. And yet just to put things into perspective, Tim Raines stole so much more often than Tim LoCastro did. So Tim LoCastro has 383 plate appearances in his career thus far, and he has stolen those 28 bases. Tim Raines in his rookie year had 363 plate appearances, so almost equivalent. And he had 71 stolen bases that year.

So yeah, the 80s were a different era, and you could see those guys go all the time. Whereas Castro is going often for his era, but not nearly as often as Reigns' era. And he still has a ways to go to catch Vince Coleman, who has the record for most consecutive steals, not just to start a career, but period, which is 50. So he is barely more than halfway there. Yeah, it can be a fun thing we watch, you know? Yeah, I hope that this does not make him less likely to attempt it, though, because he doesn't want to risk his perfection. But yeah, you got to put it at risk. You got to defend your title. He doesn't strike me as one to shy away from a challenge if you've been hit by a pitch as many times as that guy has and you keep standing in

the batter's box i think that you can like you know you can take it i think that that is an indication that you are a sturdy sort because otherwise you'd go like i'm tired of getting hit by pitches i would it would take one and I'd be like, I am retiring from baseball. Just one. That's all. From one speedster to another, I want to just talk about this Ronald Acuna Jr. play. There was a wild Sunday night baseball game. Again, this one was between Philly and Atlanta. Acuna just showed off all his skills in this one. So he would have three hits in this game and he hit a home run later in the game. But in the first inning, he beat out what was really just a routine grounder to short.

It was really impressive. It was maybe more impressive than the homer because this ball, like when I wrote about moving the mound back a few weeks ago, I noted there that like the base pass, the 90 feet between bases, technically not quite that like the base pass, the 90 feet between bases, technically not quite 90 feet, but we always say 90 feet, that more or less still works

because like runners are faster than they used to be and bigger, but fielders are bigger and faster and stronger and they throw harder. And so it mostly evens out. Like it still feels like you hit a routine ground ball and you're going to be out, and there still feel like there are the right number of close plays, bang-bang plays, and easy outs. And this one just broke the 90 feet, basically. Acuna hit this grounder to short to Didi Gregorius, and it was a fairly hard hit ball. And Gregorius didn't field it perfectly, like he didn't bobble it or anything, but he took a couple extra steps. Maybe he didn't receive it in the best possible position, partly because it was hit hard. But he could have gotten rid of it

more quickly, but with almost anyone else, it would have been fine and it would have looked totally routine, except that Acuna beat it out. And he had a 31 feet per second sprint speed on this play, which to compare to the baseline, I think the average is like 27 and elite as MLB defines it is 30. So this was faster even than elite. And Acuna is perennially one of the fastest runners on the sprint speed leaderboard. And he just beat this thing out. Like, I mean, if Gregorius could go back and do it again and know Acuna was running, like maybe he could have gotten rid of it faster. But when he did get rid of it, I think I saw somewhere Gregorius threw 88 point something miles per hour it was his hardest track throw since 2016 so really it was just like oh he broke the base pass because that is just how good and fast he is and then also he got more hits and home runs and just showed that he can do it all so that was pretty impressive and just like I feel like Acuna has been almost a little lost in the Acuna, Tatis, Soto triumvirate lately, just because Soto had such an incredible offensive season last year. And he's so precocious, so beyond his years when it comes to play discipline. And then Tatis is so incredibly exciting and scintillating.

And Acuna is really like just as good as either of them, if not better. I don't want to pick sides here because I want all sides. We don't have to just choose one. We get them all, luckily. But that speed combined with that power, like Tatis has that too. Soto doesn't really have the speed aspect of it. He's not like a super slow poke, but he doesn't give you the defense and the burner-ness that those other two do. And this was just a reminder of Acuna's all-around talent. And, you know, we have talked about him as the guy most among the current crop sort of most likely to be a 40-40 guy. And then you watch that and you're like, is this 40? Is that enough steals?

Should it be 50? Should we be pegging him for 100,000 steals? You know, you just it's not especially in the early going of a season in that first month. You know, we're constantly trying to shift between what is signal and what is noise and i think that when we see examples like sort of proof of concept of a skill that a guy can do a thing we have to remind ourselves like being able to do it amazing being able to replicate that over the course of a season not a given but then you look at acuna and you're like all of the projections are too low you've low-balled them I am convinced by this one moment that he will

execute 50 stolen bases in the course of this season because speed like that just isn't I mean it's above elite what is what is the word for that we need a new superlative yeah so yeah if if you had asked me like a couple of years ago in the great Acuna Soto debate, I probably would have taken Acuna and I feel like maybe that would have been the consensus. I don't know. But just because like Acuna, he has the power and the speed and is a pretty good defender and Soto doesn't really have the speed and hasn't had great defensive metrics at least. And so it's harder for him to be the best player in baseball maybe without being a great defender as Ted Williams was. So he is still very much in the running there. But yeah,

it felt like initially, I think before maybe we all came to appreciate just how much fun Soto is and the Soto shuffle and all of that. Because Acuna was maybe more eye-catching at first, but then it turned out no, Soto is just as fun and personable as Acuna is as well. So different skill sets, and it's really hard to pick one or the other. And as I said, fortunately, we don't have to. sort of the consensus number one prospect in the game you know and that's not to say that Juan Soto was a slouch you know you look at you look back on his ranks now and you're like oh everybody had had him too low but you know he was a he was a top 50 prospect the year he graduated at least at Fangraphs and I think that's consistent across the board like he was well regarded but you know when you when you're the number one guy um i think there is a shine and then it's not unusual for dudes who are well thought of but sort of outstripped our understanding of them when they come into the league to to kind of take the mantle but yeah we

can't shame on us if we if we sleep on ronald acuna jr that game was so great until the very end of it i know the acuna play was overshadowed by the last play, which last week we talked about a controversial call on the Michael Conforto walk-off hit by pitch. And in that case, it was not going to the replay review that made everyone mad, plus the blown call initially. In this case, it was going to the replay review and still not overturning what sure seemed to be another blown call. So this was on the sack fly where Alec Boehm scored, was called safe with the game-ending run, and the replays really seemed to pretty conclusively show that he did not actually touch the plate,

that his toe and his foot just sort of hopped over it. And for whatever reason, the call on the field was allowed to stand. It was not considered conclusive, even though I think just about everyone watching it outside of the MLB replay room thought it was. So I'm not sure what happened there. Yeah, I think that we might be due for a longer conversation about like a philosophical conversation about what we want replay to accomplish, both in the sport generally and perhaps on this podcast. Because, yeah, you want these calls, especially late in game, to be right. answer is to do away with replay entirely because as we've discussed once you have the ability to slow something down and see that the call was wrong at home you can't take that tool away from the game because that's going to make people even crazier than this but it does feel sort of uniquely

frustrating to have the tool at your disposal be able to see oh well that is wrong but and they will they will correct this error because people make mistakes. And, you know, the difference, the gap between where his foot was and where it needed to be for a run to score was very small. And so you can understand why a guy wouldn't get that right in the moment. But to then be able to look at it and say, oh, yeah, he really didn't touch home plate, but then not correct it is, you know, I don't

think that Braves fans are out of line to be frustrated and think that that should have been corrected in the moment. And, you know, that doesn't guarantee that they're going to win the game, but it sure doesn't guarantee that that's when they're going to lose it. So it sure doesn't guarantee that that's when they're going to lose it. That was hard to parse, but what I'm saying is they wouldn't have lost it just then. Right. There you go. Yeah. I don't know if it's that the replay umps are unwilling to show up their colleague or whether there's just

too much deference given to the call on the field. It just has to so conclusively be proven wrong. In this case, it sure looked like it was and just didn't clear that bar for whatever reason. Even the Phillies were not particularly pretending that he actually touched the plate. Like Boehm said, I was called safe. That's all that matters. When he was asked if he touched the plate and Joe Girardi said it looked like his big toe kind of hit the corner of the plate, which is, you know, it didn't sound like he was very confident in that either.

Didn't seem like the plate even got, like, dirty from anything touching it. It seemed pretty immaculate even after the slide. He had the delightful little pirouette as he bounced. So I don't know. Like you, I'm inclined to give the initial call a pass or excuse it because, like, he was in position to make that call. And so as long as you're hustling and getting over there in position to get a good luck at it i will forgive you for not seeing what happened in this moment where all these bodies are colliding and you know it's happening super fast i

understand how that call can be wrong but that's what we have replay for to slow it down and look at it from every angle so i don't know That was a bit of a black mark against replay. And I'm generally a pro replay person, but you got to get those calls right. So not sure what the issue was there. Even Mike Trout, who barely tweets at all, and when he does, it's always something innocuous. He responded to a Will Middlebrook's tweet

about how bad the call was and said, so bad with an ellipsis and a face with tears of joy emoji. So if even Trout is moved to tweet about it, you know you screwed something up. And speaking of tweets related to this slide, I saw a Joshian tweet that I felt like was subtweeting us about the Boehm play. He said, if we called what Alec Boehm did slide framing, no one would have a problem with the missed call. They'd just say it was hidden value, ignore that it was umpire failure, and give all the credit to Boehm. I felt targeted by this tweet. take issue with that is that it is not difficult to intervene on plays like this and not slow the game down to the point of being unplayable but you can't review every call i guess i would say in response to that well that's kind of rude um and i and i would i would further offer that I think one of the places where this differs pretty importantly is that most framed pitches that get called strikes, that doesn't seem like a good response either. I don't know that I have a response other than to say that's rude.

It's not totally inaccurate. It's not totally inaccurate it's not totally inaccurate i think though that what i would say is that um shut up yeah let us have our inconsistent appreciation for catcher framing and not caring about umpires blowing those calls i think if there is a difference I would say that we don't know that this is a demonstrable, repeatable skill. Sure. What Alec Boehm did here. There you go.

That's a good. So there's a difference. There's a difference. That's why I appreciate catcher framing. It's not just because umpires are messing up. It's because catchers are doing something that makes those pitches more likely to be called strikes. And it's a defensive skill that has always been valued and that like catchers are taught to employ from the start and now we

recognize that it's more valuable than we used to know but it's not a new thing and it's always been considered part of the catching position right you have to present a pitch it's not as if right you know that it takes skill too yeah yeah yeah and i mean sliding is certainly a skill but i don't know that sliding in such a way that umpires call it wrong is a skill like if it were if we could prove that it were and we knew that like alec bohm had some special illusion skill that he was able to make umpires make the wrong call and call him safe when he was actually out, then maybe I would actually appreciate that. But I don't think we're there yet. And I don't enjoy it as much. Aesthetically speaking, I enjoy the skill of a catcher framing a pitch and presenting a pitch

well. And I wouldn't say that I enjoy Alec Bom not actually touching the plate, but being called safe. Like a good slide can be great if you're sliding over a tag and you are legitimately safe and you're just doing a basic job of avoiding the tag. That's cool. That's not quite what Joe is talking about here, but I don't think it's quite analogous. we prove that someone actually has this repeated ability to pull the wool over umpires' eyes and slide in such a way that it convinces umpires that they saw something that didn't happen, then I might go along with it. But as it is, I don't think it's a perfect analogy, but I get it. I get what Joe's saying. He is a catcher framing opponent, or at least looks at it more as umpire inadequacy than catcher skill. And I think that that is a reasonable and flawed position. And clearly, you know, we have acknowledged that we are soon to be on the outside looking in on this issue. And in the meantime, I think that you should let us have this one because as you said it is but it is both a part of the job they have to present the pitch somehow so why not

present it as ideally as possible and there is skill there and uh i think that you know what the balance between skill on the one hand and error on the other you know there's there is some dance that's being done there but i don't think i think it understates the extent to which it is a skill to attribute the majority of that interaction to umpire error especially when you think about like some of the calls that you know that we think of when we think of a great framer it's it's very subtle right this isn't jerking theking the ball from six inches below the strike zone up into the zone and them going, ah, he's out. And then we're like, yay, good framing.

We're like, those are loud hands. So I think that the place where catchers really demonstrate the value of good presentation is in the moves that are subtle, that are close to the boundary, and that they frame up really nicely in a way that doesn't even alert either the umpire or candidly the fan to the fact that it has been framed. And so I think that that is a very, that stands in stark contrast to this. And if you're a person who sits there and says, well, that feels a lot like cheating, I would say on balance, I think that we tend to think that over the course of a season, even if it's not true over the course of a particular at-bat, that these things sort of tend to even themselves out. And that might be a place where this also differs pretty dramatically from what Boehm did.

And, you know, people were giving him a hard time about how he responded to the play where he said that he was called safe, but that's the best way to do it. It's like, you just work here, you know. It's other people's fault that a mistake was made. So, yes, that's what I'd say about that. Yeah, and some umpire mistakes are just umpire mistakes on ball and strike calls.

For sure. We don't look at every blown call and say, oh, wizardry by the catcher. Sometimes the catcher doesn't even catch it that well and it's just the umpire messes up or sometimes it goes in the other direction where the catcher catches it really well and it should have been a strike and it wasn't.

So yeah, I don't think that we automatically credit that entirely to the catcher, but there are some differences here. I get it. Yeah, I get it but also shut up someone asked us to talk about the mlb field vision replay of the acuna beating out the infield grounder which for those who haven't seen it i'll link to this video but mlb has this new stat cast based system where they sort of simulate the play with figures who they look kind of like

crash test dummies or something and they're running around in uniform and so it's using the hawkeye data that is able to see where everyone was on the field and then you can move the camera around and they act out what they actually did on the field except inevitably it looks sort of silly because it is not the actual players. It's just these generic figures who are running around. And I can see the value of this in some cases. And I know that this is like year one of the system. And I know that they're planning to maybe make it better and more lifelike in the future. But the acuna play was probably not the best demonstration of this technology no it's they look like those um the little wooden like artist dolls that you design dolls that you

can you know flex you have the ability to sort of pronate the the limbs at their various joints so that if you're like trying to go to arts school you can learn how to draw a human form and uh i was mostly struck even as a non-video game person if you look at like mlb the show these days it is so creepy and uncanny and lifelike and so to have that and then go back to this where you have grayed out guys and you know the little gray figure who's supposed to be akunya does not appear to be running as as fast as he ought to be and he doesn't have none of them have fingers and so when at the end of that of that play in real life you know akunya like points to the dugout to be like, I did it, I did it, I was safe. It's just this nub in hand pointing that way.

He's kind of running like he's a little bit constipated. Yeah, he really is. They made Ronald Acuna look less athletic somehow. It's like the stride. It's very short steps. I don't know why because that seems to be something that the system is actually tracking. But for whatever reason, when you simulate it like this, he does not look like one of

the most athletic major leaguers out there. And also like when these figures move, like their head bobs from side to side, almost like when a pigeon walks and it looks very silly. I'm just watching it again. I think he's taking such small steps to try to denote how fast he's going rather than being like a long, lumbering sort of gate, but he just looks, he doesn't look like, I don't think this is a faithful rendering.

If he is actually one of those wooden uh models uh you would not get into art school with this rendition again like i i can i can appreciate how there are going to be instances of this that are like very cool yeah and you even in highlight reels are not normally going to be dealing with something that is at such a high, you know, that is so far into the tails as that play was. Again, we need a new way to describe the speed that he demonstrated, but it looks very silly. It does. Yeah. And he has no bat either. So he just like swings nothingness and the ball goes out.

Yeah, it's weird. It maybe needs another revision. But I would like this view, if it's like a complicated play, like if there are relays going on and like multiple runners running the base and like you want to see where the cutoff man was and where was he when he made the catch and then made the throw and where was the runner at the time, it would be helpful to have this representation of the play because any one camera angle is probably not going to give you all of the actors in that one play. So to have this recreation could be quite handy, I think. But in this particular play, it's just a guy busting it down the first baseline. So you can kind of just see that with the footage or assume what it looks like.

You can kind of just see that with the footage or assume what it looks like. And it does not look more impressive with the figure, the gray man with no features. And yeah, I guess they didn't really put much effort into recreating the rest of the stadium or anything. It's just like pretty generic looking ballpark with gray stands and just emptiness. So it does not look like MLB The Show. I guess the focus is on the field and on the players and where the ball is and all of that. But yeah, I look forward to future revisions of MLB Field Vision. I think it could be great someday. Yeah, I think that we want to encourage people for a good first attempt. This is past first pancake, right? We've, we've progressed

past that, but it is, it is always going to be the, the sort of funny thing that you have when you, when there are a lot of different manifestations of technology related to the sport that you care about, it's hard not to draw comparisons between them. And so even though this does things that say the MLB, the show does not, and it is clearly pointed at a different purpose. And so it is unfair for me to compare them at all. I just naturally want to. They should take his creepy, real Acuna face from MLB The Show and just put it on the gray form and make it purposefully terrifying. Yeah.

And as much as we're nitpicking this, 10 years ago, this would have been like witchcraft if we could have seen this. And if we could have known that they would have this sort of data on where everyone was at every second during a play, that would have totally blown our minds. So we're sort of spoiled, I think, just by how much information is out there now. Yeah, it's useful to remember. I tried to keep that in mind when MLB TV has been finicky or when the... Blair said, it's like, yeah, this could be better. But also I can watch pretty much every baseball game going on simultaneously. It cost me like 120 bucks a year. So I guess understood in those terms, as a person who's not in a place that is heavily blacked out. It is a little silly to nitpick, although I have complained about far sillier things.

So don't hold me to it, anybody. And last thing I wanted to mention is that while we were watching all this baseball on Sunday, the Masters were taking place as well. And the Masters were won by Hideki Matsuyama. And as many people saw, Stephanie Epstein of SI tweeted, new Masters champ Hideki Matsuyama asked for his athletic inspirations, says he can't really name any golfers. He mostly admires baseball players. You Darvish, Shohei Otani, Kenta Maeda, which is pretty great. Those are good idols to have.

Absolutely. And like, you know, especially like Otani and darvish are so imposing as on mound figures and you know like they're just big tall strapping guys and i don't want to not give some shine to kenta like yeah that's exciting it's also nice because i still think that most people who are not baseball fans think of the average baseball player as kind of schlubby. Yeah. Right? Like I think that the mental image they have is of a, you know, like a strong but perhaps dumpy hitter. I'm being terrible. All of those bodies are beautiful. But I think that that's like the image they have is like a big burly slugger,

not someone you look at and be like, that's an athlete. And so it's cool to be like, those are athletes because they are. And so it's nice. We have to push back against the Babe Ruth of it all, I guess. It's really Babe Ruth's fault. I don't know. I hope no one takes offense to that. I don't mean that they're bad athletes.

They're great athletes. They're certainly better athletes than I am. But I do think that the sort of mental image that is conjured up is of someone who's perhaps not totally svelte and the same goes for golfers and it's not as true of golfers today as it used to be either i don't really have um a mental image of golfers at all but that's more of a of a what sports meg has cared about thing than than than a firm stance on what they have looked like over the course of time. I'm sure they're all great.

Everyone's a great athlete. Yeah. So I'm hoping that two of Matsuyama's idols will go up against each other this week because Shohei's start got pushed back because they're taking it easy with his blister. And he might possibly start Friday against the twins. And maybe there could be a Shohei versus Maeda matchup, but not sure if that will be the case yet as we speak. But if so,

that would be must-see TV for Hideki Matsuyama. So the rest of this episode will be given over to an interview. And unfortunately you were not available at the time that we recorded it. So it'll be me and two guests. And let me just set the scene here. So this interview is going to be about another great all-around athlete, perhaps the greatest and most all-around athlete of all time. I think you could make the case that that is true in baseball, of course. I'm talking about Martin Diigo, and we wanted to devote most of an episode to Diigo just because we're all talking about two-way players these days, and we're all marveling at what Otani is doing, as we should be. But I do

think that we should acknowledge the others who have gone before and have pulled off similarly impressive two-way feats. And we're in the situation where we all say, oh, it hasn't happened since Babe Ruth, and I'm guilty of that as well. But there were some real Negro League greats who were known for being elite two-way players and did that more recently than Babe Ruth. And now even MLB recognizes those performances as quote unquote major league. And therefore, when we talk about the last two-way major leaguers to be stars, we should probably be talking about Negro leaguers, players like Martin DeHigo and Bullet

Rogan and Double Duty Radcliffe and Leon Day, all of whom except Radcliffe are in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. But De Higo is in five halls of fame, which is pretty impressive. I think he and maybe Willie Wells are the only ones who can claim that. So he's in the US Hall of Fame, the Mexican, Venezuelan, Cuban, and Dominican halls of fame. And just a brief career summary to set up this conversation. So De Higo was born in 1905 in Cuba. He died in 1971, also in Cuba. And he played in the Negro Leagues from 1923 to 1936, and then again a little bit in the 40s, and just played all over the world during that time. After that time, he played in Cuba, of course. He played in the Dominican, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, just everywhere that he is in the halls of fames of. And he was an incredible hitter and

an incredible pitcher as well. And according to the SeamHeads database, in his games against Negro leaguers, he has a 143 OPS plus career as a hitter and a 133 career ERA plus as a pitcher. So he was 30 plus to 40 plus percent better than the league at everything he did. And he did everything. He not only pitched and hit and switch hit, but also played every position. And you will hear our guests say that he didn't catch, but he did catch at least once in a Negro Leagues game. So I got a breakdown from Larry Lester, our former guest, the great Negro Leagues researcher. And he had a breakdown of almost 500 Negro Leagues games that he had in his database for DeHigo. And the positional breakdown goes like shortstop, 114 games, first base 69, right field 69, third base 56, second base 49. And then he started 40-something games as a pitcher, played 33 in left

field, 27 in center. And then he caught one game as well. And I asked about the circumstances of the game that he caught and the other great Negro Leagues researcher who has helped out with the SeamHeads database, Gary Ashwell. He looked up the box score and the circumstances for that game, and here is what Gary says. DeHigo is catching the second game of a doubleheader on September 1st, 1929 against the Lincoln Giants in the Catholic Protectorate Oval in the Bronx. He was with the Hildale Club, and Hildale's regular catcher, Hall of Famer Biz Mackey, had caught every inning of the previous 27 league games,

counting the first game of that doubleheader. The second string catcher, Joe Lewis, hadn't appeared in a game since July 19th. Presumably he was injured, though I'd have to look at the newspapers to see if there's any commentary about that. So the team was carrying one catcher. Another doubleheader was scheduled for the next day in Philadelphia between the same two teams. Mackey would catch both ends of that one. So you'd have to guess that DeHigo was spelling him in the first doubleheader as an emergency move so Mackey didn't have to catch

four games in two days. And DeHigo had one put out and no assists, committed one error, and allowed two stolen bases on two attempts. So perhaps he was not a great catcher, but he was capable of playing catcher as well as everything else. And perhaps he was not a great catcher, but he was capable of playing catcher as well as everything else. And when he was in the lineup as a starting pitcher, he hit all over the place. I don't think he hit leadoff or second, but he batted third, he batted fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, all over the place. And sometimes he was managing, so he would pencil himself into the lineup. And just like the testimonials from everyone he played against, like there are so many quotes from just other great players being awed by what DeHigo accomplished.

And Johnny Mize, the Hall of Famer who played against him, I think later in his career in 43, maybe in the Dominican when he was a manager as well, said he was the only guy I ever saw who could play all nine positions, manage, run, and switch hit. maybe in the Dominican when he was a manager as well, said he was the only guy I ever saw who could play all nine positions, manage, run, and switch hit. So he did it all really. And Buck Leonard, the great Hall of Famer said, he was the greatest all-around player I know. I'd say he was the best ballplayer of all time, black or white. He could do it all. He was my ideal ballplayer. If he's not the greatest, I don't know who is. You take your Ruths, Cobbs, and DiMaggio's, give me De Higo, and I bet I'd

beat you almost every time. There are many other quotes like that who just says that he was like an otherworldly talent at every position. So in the same way that Otani has almost ruined every other player for me, just because he does both things. I think if I had seen De Higo, he probably would have ruined every player, including Otani, because not only could he hit and pitch, but he could play every position well. And so in the 1980s, the Negro Leagues players who were still around were asked to vote on an all-time team, and they knew that De Higo had to be on it, but they couldn't figure out where to put him because you could put him at any position.

So he got votes at three different positions and they ended up making him the second baseman on the all-time team, even though that was not one of his most frequent positions. But it's just like, got to pick somewhere and put him somewhere. And yeah, just really an incredible player, pick somewhere and put him somewhere. And yeah, just really an incredible player, won home run titles in the Negro Leagues and was just a dominant starter too, especially in other countries. So he was also just a legend in Cuba and other countries for who he was off the field. As we will hear in this segment, I wanted to learn more and hear more about De Higo. And so our guests will be Martin De Higo's youngest son, Gilberto De Higo, who was 19 when his father passed away. So he got to know him as a person and has since written a book about him, a biography. So he knows him from that perspective

too. So he was able to join from Orlando and De Higo, of course, was bilingual because he could do everything. My Spanish is not quite podcast interview quality and Gilberto felt more comfortable giving the interview in Spanish as well. So we were joined by Adrian Burgos, who translated for us, but also offered his own expertise because he is an expert on the Negro Leagues and the history of Latinos in US sports as well. And he's a professor of history at the University of Illinois, who's written books about the Negro Leagues and other Latino players and figures in Latino baseball. So I was happy to have him translate, but also chime in and add some context where necessary. So that will be the interview.

And I hope that everyone appreciates DeHigo after that as much as I have come to lately. I'm so excited. It's one of the many sad things about Sam not being able to do Effectively Wild anymore is that I very rarely get to listen to Effectively Wild as a non-participant. And I miss that because, Ben, you're a good podcaster. So I am very excited to listen to this interview and get to learn more about a player who I think the omission seems quite glaring. So I am looking forward to this. Yep yep and he's nicknamed el maestro and the immortal as well with good reason i think so uh so this interview will be in spanish and then also in english and uh we will honor martin de he goes two languages and playing all over the world with

the rest of this podcast so we'll be back in just one moment with Gilberto, Diego, and Adrian Burgos. down. I just want to stick around for a while. I just want to stick around for a while. I'm in it for the long haul, baby. So you're just gonna have to wait. All right, now I am happy to be joined by two guests who will help us talk about the legacy of Martin Diego. And first, we are joined by Martin's youngest son, Gilberto Diego. Gilberto, hola, bienvenidos. Gracias por venir. Thank you. Thank you very much.

I'm glad for you, for you. I'm sorry for my English. Not very, not good, but I try speaking English sometimes, you know? Well, thank you for trying, but you won't have to speak English sometimes, you know? Well, thank you for trying, but you won't have to speak English only today because we are also joined by Professor Adrian Burgos, who has agreed to help us translate and also talk a little bit about Martin and the legacy of Latino players in the Negro Leagues. Welcome, Professor Burgos.

Thanks for having me on, Ben. Very much appreciate to be here and to meet the other son of my Dean Diego. I had the pleasure of meeting my Dean Jr. many years ago in San Fuegos, Cuba. So now I get a better sense of the whole family. So, Gilberto, tell me a little bit about growing up and knowing your father. What was he like as a father and what did he tell you about his baseball career? The question is, can I tell you about your father and what he told you about his career in baseball? Well, my father was, for me, my father. I didn't understand that he was a great baseball player. Bueno, mi padre fue para mí mi padre. Yo no entendía que él era un gran jugador de béisbol. Era mi papá y mi papá que iba a mi casa por las tardes y hacíamos competencias de conocimiento de historia de Cuba. of Cuba. When he started to be a

coach from a place close to where I lived, I started to go to the ball because of the contagion, because I listened to other people talking about being a ball coach. The only glove of the ball that I had in my life, he gave it to me.

Okay, so, Gilberto answers that he was, for him, Martín Higo was his father. He did not see him as his great big ball player. He saw him, and he knew him as his father. Instead of baseball, when growing up, they would all gather together, and they would have trivia contests over Cuban history. And that's one of the things they would do as a family, as kids.

Eventually, he began to basically, he caught the baseball bug by everybody else playing. And he was very interested in playing. And he began. And the very first glove that he got, the only glove he had as a kid, was given to him by his father. Pero incluso en esa época, que yo empecé a jugar, yo tendría seis años, por supuesto no tenía las habilidades que pudo tener él de niño. Yo era un muchacho que trataba de quedar bien con su papá. Y entonces yo empecé un equipo de pequeñas ligas y me punchaba con frecuencia.

Y él se burlaba de mí con un grupo de muchachos más. Cada vez que yo iba a batir, se burlaba. Every time I went to bat, he would make fun of me. So one day I asked him why he didn't teach me. And he told me that nobody taught him, that I had to learn alone. So he said that, you know, he was about six years old. He didn't have the talent or skills that his father had, but he started playing Little League baseball and he would strike out a lot. no tenía los talentos o habilidades que su padre tenía, pero empezó a jugar al béisbol de la Liga, y él se golpeaba mucho, y su padre estaba en la silla,

y se reía y se jodía con los chicos sobre Gilberto golpeando. Y entonces Gilberto le preguntó, ¿cómo es que no me enseñas? Y su padre dijo, nadie me enseñó, solo empecé a jugar, solo aprendí. fútbol, los deportes con los entrenadores que habían ahí y siempre los entrenadores le decían,

yo pasaba un mes, mes y medio y los entrenadores decían, tengo a tu hijo Martín y yo esperaba que él viniera a mí. Todas esas cosas yo las dije aquí en este libro, en mi padre el inmortal, que lo acabo de traducir al inglés. hey, I have your son, he's doing well. And Gilberto hoped that his father would come to him and would check out how he's doing in all these other sports that somehow strike up envy or jealousy about, hey, everybody else gets to train him. And so all of these stories that Gilberto shared with us, he wrote down as part of his book, Mi Padre Inmortal, My Father, the Immortal is the nickname, the immortal. And it's just been translated into English. So pretty soon everyone else will be able to access the stories.

Great. And did you feel pressure, Gilberto, growing up as the son of one of the greatest players of all time and one of the players who could do everything, play every position and hit and pitch so well. tan bueno en jugando los deportes como su papá? Bueno, en realidad, Sergio Martín Díaz en esa etapa de mi vida fue, vamos a decir, como que me perseguía, ¿no? Yo recuerdo que yo empecé a jugar béisbol

por fuera, por la calle y adquirí habilidades y tuve bastantes habilidades jugando béisbol. Y entonces fui a ese sitio donde él era entrenador con el equipo de la escuela. Ya pasaban unos años. Yo tendría como 12 años por ahí. Y el entrenador de la escuela, cuando supo que yo era hijo de Martín Díaz, me puso cuarto bate.

Entonces, cuando yo llegué ahí, eso fue una sensación porque él fue a verme. So, of course, like during that period of his life, it was something, you know, big to be the son of Martin Diego. But he still had to develop. And so he started playing baseball on the streets. to develop. And so he started playing baseball on the streets. And then after a few years, he eventually got to the academy where his father was also one of the coaches. And he began to train under other coaches and the coach put him in the cleanup spot in the four hole in the lineup. And then, you know, everyone started gathering around to see how, you know, the son of Martin Diego, Diego, cómo iba a jugar en el cleanup. And if I learned something that he told me at some point in conversations or with the people with whom he spoke, sometimes I heard it was that he always came to warm the pitcher because the pitcher, when he warmed up,

he always discovered his secrets and I already knew that the strong weapon of that pitcher was the curve. And then I put myself in the box in front and waited for the curve. So he was a catcher at this point and he was batting fourth and his first set bat there was a runner on second. And he knew that because he had been watching the opposing pitcher that he had a lot. His best pitch was his curveball. su mejor pichero era su curveball. Y una de las cosas que recuerda su padre enseñándole y acusándole es que cuando estás en el balcón siempre mira a un pichero opuesto calentarse.

Tienes una sensación de sus mejores piches y así sabía que ese pichero opuesto era un curveballer. Y así salió a la mesa con confianza. And so he stepped to the plate confidently. iba de tercera, que fue triple. Llegué fácil, impulsé la carrera y llegué fácil a la tercera. Después, en otro turno del bate, batí cuatro veces, dos rollies por el cuadro, batí otro hit

e impulsé otra carrera. Se me fue al robo un jugador y lo atrapé. Y cuando se terminó el partido, él fue a donde estaba yo y me dijo, porque él me decía el término, güey, como se dice en México. So he stepped into the batter's box that first time up, and the pitcher surprised him, threw a fastball, first pitch. And so he watched it, strike one.

Then threw another fastball, and he filed this off, and a third fastball in a row, and he filed that off. So a third fastball in a row and he filed that off so he was behind oh and two but he kept watching it's like he's gonna throw me a curveball now and so finally he got that curveball he lined it over third base and actually all the way and got a triple out of it bringing in the runner and in his four turns at bat he had a couple of them a couple of hits drove in another run and you know after the game his father comes up to him and Y en sus cuatro turnos en el bat, tenía un par de golpes, se fue a otro rango. Y, ya sabes, después del partido, su padre se va a él y tiene su expresión mexicana.

Diciendo, ya sabes, hey, hombre, es un hey, güey. Me dijo, güey, finalmente aprendiste a jugar pelota. Y me dio 10 pesos. Me dio 10 pesos. Me profesionalizó en ese momento mi papá. Luego, en el servicio militar obligatorio, el capitán de la unidad, cuando se enteró también que yo era hijo de Martín Díaz, también

me puso cuarto bate. Y en ese juego, el pitcher rival era el capitán de la otra unidad, que era un guajiro que lo que tiraba era una recta de humo. Y entonces no tiraba curvas, lo que tiraba era recta tenía mucha velocidad

y entonces me puse en el cajón de atrás cuando fui a batear, cogí el bate corto y he espachado una línea por el center field, buenísima y llegué bien a primera leí dos hits ese día a partir de ahí el capitán me dio todos los pases que yo quería

finalmente su padre me dijo, Juez finalmente aprendiste a jugar al béisbol From there, the captain gave me service in Cuba, he started playing baseball there. And when the unit commander saw that he's the son of Martin Diego, again, they put him on the team, cleanup hitter. And the first game he played, he was watching the other pitcher who was actually the captain from another unit on the base. And so he noticed that all he had was fastball fastball and as Gilberto describes it it was like smoke it's just fast fast but since he knew what his uh that pitcher strength was he went ahead and had a couple of hits and his own captain after Gilberto has such a great game it's

like anytime you need a pass I'll get you a pass I'll get you a pass I'll get you a pass, I'll get you a pass, I'll get you a pass. Ahora, realmente nunca me preocupó ser hijo de Martín Díaz. Yo traté de hacer mi propio desarrollo deportivo y jugaba basquetbol. Yo empecé a jugar baloncesto y como jugador de baloncesto integré la Selección Nacional Universitaria de Cuba. Estuve en los campeonatos de primera categoría en Cuba y jugué basquetbol. A mí eso realmente nunca me preocupó ni me preocupa porque mi padre es una personalidad y yo soy otra personalidad. Al contrario, a mí me da mucho placer ser hijo de Martín Díaz, pero yo he hecho una carrera en mi vida gracias a mis esfuerzos, porque yo me hice periodista luego que murió mi padre y he tenido resultados excelentes como periodista. It was very unusual to be Martin Diego's son, maybe when I was a child, yes. Not because I was Martin Diego's son, but because they mocked me. Him and others more.

Maybe that's why I rejected giving him the baseball at one point. But after I grew up, I understood that that wasn't my path and I took another path. He never worried, and he's never been worried about and preoccupied, concerned with being Martin Diego's son. He went on to play basketball and actually excelled in Cuba, played on the university team that won the top level championship, the national championship in Cuba, played on the Cuban national team. And similarly, in understanding that his father was Martin Diego, was his own person, and that Gilberto, he's another person. And so he became a journalist and he excelled at that. It was never his preoccupation, his main goal in life to somehow become Martin Diego. He had to become his own

person. And so what made you later in life want to write a book about your father and learn more about his history and document it for everyone? esa historia con todos nosotros. En primer lugar, yo quería que vieran a Martín Diego como lo vi yo, como un ser humano. No solamente como el gran jugador de béisbol, porque los deportistas tienen un entorno donde son admirados por sus aficionados,

por la gente que los sigue, pero todos tenemos otra vida. Es decir, te pongo el ejemplo de Armando Maradona. Fue grande en el fútbol, pero en su vida social dejó mucho que desear. Y yo quería que vieran a Martín Digo como lo que era mi padre, el hombre que me enseñó a amar la historia, el hombre que me dejó muchos consejos dentro de su entorno. Y me parecía que no era justo The first motivation was to write the book. libro y mantengo su legado vivo. Después te quiero decir cómo fue que comencé a pensar en escribir el libro. The first motivation was that he wanted everyone to see Martin Diego like he saw

him as a person, as a human being, as a father. Journalists and fans who knew Martin Diego as an athlete, as a baseball player, they got to see that side of him but not the whole side of who he was. Diego Maradona was a great soccer player, football player. People knew about his great achievements on the field but off the field he had lots of challenges and problems and he wanted people to know, to get to know his father, my father, Martin Diego, who taught him, Gilberto, how to love history, who advised him on how to be a good person. It would be an injustice for people just to know him as a baseball player and

not really get to know him for who he was as a social being, as someone who did good beyond the baseball field. This is what was Gilberto's motivation for writing the book, that he wanted to keep that legacy of the entirety of who Martin Diego is alive, and that's also the motivation for creating the foundation, Martin Diego, that he wants people to understand that broader legacy, that person who was Martín Diego and not las fronteras de Cuba. que el aduanero vio mi apellido, me preguntó que si yo era hijo de Martín Diego. Y yo le dije que sí. Y a partir de ese momento mi vida entró en un torbellino,

porque cuando salí del aeropuerto yo no sé cómo se enteraron los periodistas que estaba yo ahí y comenzaron a acosarme, a preguntarme y a decirme. Y a la vía donde yo estaba hospedado fueron decenas de personas que habían sido amigos de él o fanáticos que lo vieron jugar a saludarme, a regalarme cosas, a hablar de mi papá. Y yo realmente estaba en medio And so he didn't really know the legacy or the impact that his father had outside of Cuba. So the first time in 1978, when he was traveling as a basketball player, as part of the university team to the Dominican Republic here he is a history major at

the University and had never traveled outside of Cuba and he arrived to the Dominican Republic and someone asked him they noticed his last name they asked him are you this related are you the son of my team Diego and he said yes that was my father and he said from that moment on the recipe entering to this whirlwind where he doesn't know how but as he exited the the airport and he got to the hotel he was followed by sports writers and fans and he came to the hotel la villa where he was staying and they wanted to meet Gilberto to talk to them. And that's when it really hit him about the impact

of who his father was outside of Cuba. This was the first time he really got to experience how much others so appreciated the ballplayer and the man that his father was. At the end, those 20 days that I was in the Dominican Republic y el hombre que era su padre. The man came to tell me that he would not stay in the Dominican Republic. I said no, that I felt revolutionary that I was going to return to Cuba. So he was there for 20 days, staying there. And the people were just so effusive about their love and passion for Martin Diego and to meet him. And they brought him gifts and they shared a bunch of stories with him and

during this period There was always Cuban security guards military personnel that accompanied the teams that travel and one of the guards told invento Don't stay here. Don't think get ideas about staying here in the Dominican Republic and and you bet those oh, no, don't worry I'm very much, you no, no te preocupes, estoy muy, me siento, soy un revolucionario, soy parte del país de Cuba,

no voy a ir a ningún lugar. Cuando regresé a Cuba, me di cuenta de ese impacto y comencé a investigar a Martín Díaz como sujeto histórico. Y fui a la Biblioteca Nacional y empecé a sacar todos los periódicos de la época. Comencé a entrevistar personas que lo conocieron, familiares, jugadores que habían estado con él en esa época que todavía quedaban vivos. And that's when I started to build this project of the sports part, united to my memories of my father. And that's the result of my father, El Inmortal,

which in English is going to be Martin Diego, my father, El Inmortal, in English. My father, El Inmortal. So returning back to Cuba, and this is where he's sharing the story of really the genesis of the book project. Because he returns to Cuba, as he noted before, he's a history major. So he starts thinking about Martín Diego as a historical subject. And he goes to the library and starts getting the newspaper stories and clippings. And he goes out and he starts interviewing players who played with his father.

And gathering all the, because many of them were still alive. And he goes out and he starts interviewing players who played with his father and gathering all the, because many of them were still alive and he was able to talk to them about who his father was playing in Cuba and elsewhere and gather those stories. And that really was the start of the book. And in English, it's going to be called Martin Diego, my father, the immortal. So tell me a little bit about the beginning of your father's baseball career. How did he leave Cuba and come to the United States? jugar en los Estados Unidos? Bueno, en realidad venir a los Estados Unidos fue decisivo para Martín

Digo, un muchacho que tenía apenas 16 años. Él en 1923 es firmado por el Havana y automáticamente va a entrar a los Cuban Start de Pelayo y Chacón, pero era tal su desespero

por salir que también hizo palabras con los otros que iban a estar de Abel Linares. Mi abuelo, que fue sargento del ejército libertador frente a España, Benito Díaz, un hombre se ganó los jalones con el machete en la mano, luchando por la libertad y sobre todo por la libertad de los esclavos, ya que su abuela, mi tatarabuela, había sido esclava. what he could do with Martin. But so many people told Benito about Martin's abilities that he agreed to leave Cuba. And so he left Cuba as a 16 year old. And again, I'm not translating perfectly everything, but I'm going to give you the story, kind of relay the story. So as a 16 year old, 1923, he had signed with Havana, and he agreed to play with actually both Cuban Stars teams. He had agreed to play with Pelayo Chacon's team, which was based out east, and with Abel Linares'

Cuban Stars team, which was based out of the Midwest, played in Chicago and Cincinnati. And finally, he turned to his grandfather to try to figure out and that one of the notable things is that his grandfather Benito Diego was a soldier in the what's called the Cuban Liberation Army the Hesito Libertador who fought for Cuban independence in 1895 and 1896-1897-1898 his grandfather is very well known as one of the soldiers the Mambi soldiers. And he also notes that his great grandmother had, that they fought for the liberation of the enslaved in Cuba, that his great grandmother had been a slave. And so that Benito came to talk, well, people talked to Benito saying, your son's really good.

And you have to help and you have to basically give your blessing for him to go and play in the United States because he's really good. And you have to help. And you have to basically give your blessing for him to go and play in the United States. Because he's that good. One correction. Was Sargent. Not Sergeant. He was a Sergeant. He was an officer. He wasn't just a regular soldier.

Sargent. I told you he was a Sergeant because the grades were won by combat. That Sergeant indicated that he had a degree of bravery. So, Gilberto notes that Benito was a sergeant and the way you gain your rank in the Ejército Libertador is through combat and having fought valiantly in combat. And so he had risen up the ranks and was an officer or sergeant in that army. And so that meant he was in charge of others as well. Insisto en eso para que vean el carácter de Benito,

que no era un individuo fácil. So he insists on making that correction because that way we know about the character of Benito Diego and that he's no pushover in terms of, you know, he's just going to agree to whatever anybody tells him. Entonces, él finalmente viaja con los que iban a estar

de Pelayo y en esa temporada que esos equipos venían 12, 13, 14 jugadores, no más, porque se ganaba por la recolección, no por salario, no more, because they won by collection, not by salary, but by what they collected when the fans came in. He had to play practically all the positions,

not just him, but all the other players played one, two, up to three positions. So, Martín Diego ends up signing with Pelayo Chacón's Cuban Stars, 1, 2, up to 3 positions. had to play multiple positions because it was a very short roster. And so they began to play and what they earned was based on that gate. Whatever they collected in terms of what the fans paid to see them and that was their share. They would have to split it 12, 13 or 14 ways depending on

the number of players on the team. Entonces jugó Señor Estor jugó primera, jugó segunda llegó a lanzar por el equipo, jugaba a los jardines So he said that Martín, starting to play with the Cuban Stars, he played short, he played first, second pitcher, he played in the outfield, third base. The only position he didn't play was catcher. And that when Gilberto was a youth playing catcher,

that Martín told him, you know, the only folks that play catchers are huellas. Hold on one second. Gilberto, huellas como en animal o como... Es decir, animal de... De océano. Es decir, con lo que se hará, ¿no? Yeah.

And so huellas are... Like a bull, ¿no? Bull, yes. Yeah. Bull, no? Bull, yes. Bull, no balls. Right, those are the only ones who play. And my team told them, find yourself another position. Don't be a catcher. That possibility gave him a versatility that he already had. Esa posibilidad le dio tener una versatilidad que ya tenía. Y en esa temporada los aficionados le pusieron el hombre de la suerte,

porque a pesar de no tener un gran averaje ese primer año, dio los batazos que tenía que dar en los momentos decisivos. Comenzó muy mal a la ofensiva, pero después se compuso. Incluso hay crónicas de Pelayo a la prensa elogiando el desarrollo que tuvo Martín quiero decir con esto que la cantidad de juegos que hacían tanto oficiales como extraoficiales este equipo que a veces jugaban ciento y tantos juegos

le dio una posibilidad del juego diario a Martín Digo de cuando regresara a Cuba ya estar más curtido, ser un pelotero diferente, porque hay que decir, la Liga de Acolor no era una liga fácil, era una 17 years old, to face that reality was really the school that he needed to push himself. What Gilberto notes is that what Martin Diego was able to do in 1923 in that rookie season was to exhibit the versatility that was already within his abilities, that it actually gave him that opportunity. Some of his teammates called him the lucky guy, the man of good fortune, because he played wherever anyone else couldn't play on the field, and that actually gave him the opportunity to develop. Pelayo Chacon described the development of Martín Diego

in his versatility and playing every day. And that this was, the Negro Leagues was not an easy league. You know, the travel was difficult. The level of play was high. And he was just 16 years old. And what better school of training could someone have than what Martín Diego had in that 1923 season because he was playing every day he was filling every slot in the field and that when he came back to Cuba he was such a better player because now he had this experience of basically playing anywhere and

everywhere and excelling. Mira, aquí te voy a leer una nota que se escribió en 1923, que aparece en el libro, del Heraldo de Cuba. Y es lo que dice Pelayo. Dice Pelayo que este era uno de los que veía con claridad la facultad de pitcher de Diego. Y por eso, cierto día, que los mejores lanzadores del club habían hecho explosión, that the best club scorers had made an explosion, Pompey decided to please Pelayo, putting the peasant of Drake and Boa, two players of that era, on the line of fire. So he shared a quote from the Herald,

the Cuban Herald, it was in Spanish, Heraldo de Cuba, from November 20th, 1923, which describes the development and the abilities of Martín on the mound, where Pelayo Chacón convinced 20 de noviembre de 1923, que describe el desarrollo y las habilidades de Martín en la montaña, donde Belayo Chacón convenció

a Alex Pompez a poner a Valentín Drake y también a Martín para tomar sus turnos en la montaña. Entonces, los contrarios aseguraban que Dejigo, porque así pronunciaban el apellido en Estados Unidos, Dejigo, no tenía nada.

Pero el hecho cierto y innegable fue que no pudieron batearle más que un hit. En otra ocasión, Lincoln Heant pulverizó a otro pitcher regular de los que iban a estar en el inning de apertura anotándole cinco carreras en menos tiempo que es necesario para hacer historia. So the other people on the opposing team had said that De Higo had nothing. five races in less time than necessary to make history. runs off. So there we begin to see an indication of the ability. And again, it was only 16 years

old. This is part of what to me was so fascinating. Now I'm editorializing from my own research for Cuban Star. You have a 16-year-old Martín Diego just excelling in the Negro Leagues against this type flight competition. I mean, he was pitching against the Pittsburgh Crawfords and playing against the Crawfords and the other great teams of the Negro Leagues during this period. It's amazing. Adrian, could I ask you just to give us a brief summary of Alex Pompez's career? Because I know you've written a in Tampa, but comes to Harlem in 1910 as a 20 year old. And he loved baseball. And one of the first things he helps to do is to form a team called the Cuban Stars. And in the book, Cuban Star, how one Negro League owner changed the face of baseball. I talked about his showdown with the Belenars over the team. But in 1923, he was during the wintertime, he went down to Cuba, and he actually saw Martín Diego playing. And he sought to convince and Pelayo Chacón was the manager of the team. And so they, you know, wanted to get Diego to come and they were successful in bringing him in.

So one of the really interesting things for me, and this is a scout, John Crick noted this, that a lot of the players that Alex Pompez really liked were very similar to my team, Diego. Long limbs, the kind of sinewy build, tall with ability to run and really have multiple tools. And so the Eagle would go from being one of his players to the manager of the Cuban Stars on multiple occasions, just like he would manage in the Mexican League, in the Cuban League, in the Venezuelan League. And so, you know, Alex Pompez and the career of Martín Diego kind of in an eagerly are parallel tracks about the ability to have such greatness

come out of Cuba and then even expand beyond Cuba. This is really the story of the Cuban stars and the story of Diego. It's about going not just to the United States, but throughout the Caribbean world and Latin American baseball world and having an impact. I want to add something to what you said about Pompez. de la ego, es sobre ir no solo a los Estados Unidos, sino a todo el mundo caribeño y el mundo de la liga de fútbol latinoamericana y tener un impacto. Tetelo Vargas fue uno de los jugadores de la República Dominicana. Pancho Coimbre de Puerto Rico también integró los que iban a estar.

Es decir, que tanto Pelayo como Alex tuvieron esa visión de llevar al jugador latinoamericano a tierra de Estados Unidos. Ellos dos. Porque el otro equipo desapareció, que era el de Abel Linares, who was the owner of the Havana and Almendares teams. But over time, that team that played in the West, even played white, but in the East League, only black people played and they were black Latin Americans. Republic. Pancho Corimbe, a great hitter from Puerto Rico who actually went a whole season in the Puerto Rican league without striking out one time and hit over 400 that season. And you had players and, you know, this is in contrast to Abel Linares' team. Abel, who in the Cuban league owned Armendariz and Havana,, two of the biggest teams. But his team played primarily in the Midwest and included white Cubans that were playing in the

Negro Leagues. Bompez's contribution was that he brought Black Latino players from throughout the Caribbean into the Negro Leagues and really expanded the game that way. And of course, DeHigo is in five halls of fame, the US, the Mexican, Venezuelan, Cuban, Dominican halls of fame. And Adrian, was it very common for players, as De Higo did, to go from country to country and league to league? And I know that Martin played in independent leagues as well as in the Negro League. So just to make ends meet, to make money, was it very typical for players to be Globetrotters in that way? The very best Latino players could become Globetrotters and play in

the top leagues. Because the Mexican League during the 1930s and 1940s, they had the top talent throughout Latin America. They recruited the top talent that they could out of the Negro Leagues. This is where you see Monty Irving and Roy Campanella and Satchel and Josh. All those guys are coming. They're also getting Martín Diego. They're also getting white Cubans away from the major leagues to come and play in Mexico. So that was really, I would argue, during that period of time, as close to a major league you're going to get without being MLB outside of the Negro Leagues. And so we see a number of talented ballplayers. Luis Rodriguez Olmo, who had played outfield for the Brooklyn Dodgers for several years, goes down to Mexico during this period and the war period, in particular World War II time.

And this is where you also see Martin Diego have the opportunity to be a manager and one of the fascinating stories that I think sometimes we don't get enough appreciation for is that in the Mexican League in Venezuela in a couple of these other leagues the ego managed a team that was basically integrated. In the eyes of people in the United States, if that team played in the U.S. League, it would be seen as integrated because you had light-skinned Cubans, darker-skinned Puerto Ricans and Cubans and Dominicans and Mexicans all playing together. And he was the manager. And one of the important things about that story is that these men had the experience of managing integrated clubs that if when Major

League integration happened, they could have been brought along. You could have had someone like Martin Diego managing a team in Major League Baseball, but Major League Baseball was slow to do that. I want to add something to what you say, that Martin Diego was the first important figure algo a lo que tú dices, que Martín Diego fue la primera figura importante que tuvo la liga mexicana. Es decir, hay que recordar que esta liga mexicana no hubiera funcionado si no hubiera sido por el dinero de Jorge Pasquel, al que no se

le da el suficiente mérito. Pasquel comenzó una guerra contra las grandes ligas, contratando a peloteros de grandes ligas con salarios que no ganaban en grandes ligas. Mas Lanier, Mickey Owens, esos jugadores fueron para México. Es más, el patón Carrasquel,

venezolano lanzador, desechó un contrato en grandes ligas para ir a jugar a la liga mexicana. So, Gilberto reminds us that Martín Diego was really the first big star, the marquee signing of Jorge Pascual that really gave the project of the Mexican League standing. And then Pascual doesn't get enough credit because Pascual is able to recruit Jalania, Mickey Owens, other white major league players to come down and play at salaries that were beyond what they were earning in the United States in the major leagues. And that pitcher, his nickname was El Baton, Alejandro Carascal from the Washington Senators,

was recruited down to play in the Mexican League again, earning much more there than what he had earned in the major leagues. And that's what attracted top flight ballplayers from the United States and from across Latin America to play in a racially integrated Mexican league. But the first guy that really set that whole thing off was getting Martin Diego to come. It's Pascal, not Pascual, Pascal. Pascal.

Pascal, it's Pascal. Es Pascal, no Pascual, Pascal. Pascal. Pascal, es Pascal. Pascal creó incluso las grandes hazañas de Martín Díaz. Se hacen en México. Cuando él llega a México, a Veracruz, había una multitud esperando y él pensaba que venía alguna figura y lo estaban esperando a él y lo llevaron cargado hasta la alcaldía, los aficionados mexicanos. a series of plus marks in Mexico that Martin Diigo has, which was the first of all that Pascal signed,

who came to Mexico and raised the league to levels that he didn't have before. Then came the others, but Martin Diigo was the first figure. So Gilberto reminds me that it's Pascal because Pascual would be like Camilo Pascual,

totally different last name. Pascal was the one who brought in Diego and that the welcome that Martin Diego received was so amazing and big. He arrives, he signs with Veracruz, and he was stunned when he gets there because there's such a crowd there. And they basically carried Martin Diego on their shoulder to City Hall in Veracruz. At first, when he saw the crowd, he's like, some superstar, some big figure must be arriving. He didn't realize that that welcome was for him.

They bring him to City Hall. Of course, he has this amazing year and career in Mexican League. He threw the first no-hitter in the Mexican League and he would just have this series of success as a player and as a manager. He was a player manager for Veracruz. And so that is part of his legacy in the Mexican League. Did he have a favorite place to play? Did he prefer to play at home? Because I imagine when he played in the United States, he had to face more discrimination, more segregation. So how did he feel about the conditions that he faced there? Martín Diego tenía un lugar favorito de jugar, una nación donde prefirió jugar. Y también, la segunda pregunta es, los pensamientos de Martín Diego sobre jugando en los Estados Unidos durante esa época, cuando tenía esa línea de color y la segregación racial.

Sí, sí, yo entendí la pregunta, en primer lugar el equipo que siempre amó, que le he dicho por él que le quedó en el corazón fue el equipo Unión Laguna de Torreón donde él ganó en 1942

de hecho yo comencé un programa por Youtube que se llama Martín Digo, su fundación. Y tengo una sección que recuerda los 80 años que va a ser el año que viene, donde el equipo Torreón ganó. Ese equipo fue el equipo dicho por él en sus propias memorias que le quedó en el corazón. And he stayed in his heart. A team where he was a manager and a player. He pitched and played in the gardens. And he did everything in that season. So the first team that he mentions that kind of won his heart as a special place in Martín Diego's heart was La Unión de Tarrión. The team from Tarrión. Torrión, Torrión.

Oh, Torrión. Torrión. the team from Torreón. Torreón, Torreón. Oh, Torreón. Torreón. And so that was the place where he had his first managing player manager, won the championship, and it just kept a special place in his heart for what he achieved there.

The second question, yes, he hated racism. Sí, él odiaba el racismo. De hecho, él consideraba que las ligas negras era un asalto en lo tocante a todas las necesidades que pasaban los jugadores negros en esa época, en esa liga donde, bueno, solamente la liga negra comenzó a ganar un poco más después de los 30, casi en los 40. Pero esos primeros años que fue le negaban el agua, no podían comer en los restaurantes. Muchas veces tenían que dormir en las iglesias o en el propio ómnibus. Él recibió el racismo en el pecho y lo detestaba. Además, Martín Díaz siempre fue un hombre de ideas sociales liberales inculcadas precisamente por su padre, por mi abuelo Benito Díaz, un hombre de ideas libertarias. Y eso lo condujo en un momento determinado a simpatizar

con el Partido Socialista Popular. Martín Díaz tenía una idea clara sobre la que era la justicia to sympathize with the Socialist Popular Party. That is, Martin Diego had a clear idea about what justice was, and that's how it was pronounced, unlike other players who were only in the sport. He had a vision of social struggle. So, Martin Diego hated racism.

He felt that the Negro Leagues were a hardship because of how the players had to deal with being refused water, being refused places to stay, having to stay at other Negro Leagues places, you know, in funeral homes, wherever they can find a place to stay, not being allowed to stay in hotels. hotels and that those things, his antipathy for racism was really taught to him by his father Benito Diego. Those ideas about those social ideas about justice, about liberation. This was at the core of what his father Benito Diego had fought for in Cuba as part of the Cuban Liberation Army. And that this is part of what really motivated Martín de Higo to join the Socialist Party in terms because they fought for a vision about treating everyone equally. That was what he had learned from his own father and what

his father had sought to teach everyone. And so while he is encountering this racism and resistance, he is becoming a better and better baseball player. And you told us about the beginning of his career and how he was so versatile and a great pitcher. But I know that he soon became one of the best hitters in the Negro Leagues, and he worked on hitting the curveball until he was great at that too. So ultimately, how would you sort of summarize his greatness as a player, you know, as a pitcher compared to as a hitter and where was he best on the field? You already explained the first days of your career playing in the United States and how primeros días de su carrera jugando en los Estados Unidos y cómo puede hablar sobre cómo él aprendió a ser un bateador tremendo y también sobre jugando como una superestrella siendo aquí en los Estados Unidos y en las diferentes ligas. ¿Puede darnos un sumario

de la carrera de Martín Díaz. Bueno, mi memoria no es tan buena para hacer un sumario así en términos generales, pero yo digo que Martín Díaz, salvando la diferencia, fue el Mozart del béisbol. Tú no puedes significar que hay personas que vienen con una genialidad inherente a ellos mismos. Mozart a los 8 años hizo su primer concierto y así sucesivamente vemos niños que son talentosos y uno no entiende cómo puede tener ese talento. Martín Dehido

desde niño jugaba béisbol. Ya a los 11 años jugaba con jugadores mayores que él. Es decir que esa genialidad del béisbol, él la tenía inherente. Muchos personas decían que cuando él salía

él tenía una oriola que se notaba enseguida que era, salvando también la distancia, como un torero, como un matador. Se le veía en el uniforme. Eso es inexplicable decir cómo adquirió ese talento, porque el talento lo tenía. Ahora, el talento lo fue llevando a esculpir gracias a que jugaba en todas partes de lo que era la América beisbolera. talent was brought to sculpt thanks to the fact that he played everywhere in what was baseball America. So first, Gilberto says his memory is not so great to provide a grand summary of all of the achievements and everything.

But he notes that a lot of this was present early on in Martín Diego's childhood. He was naturally talented at so many things. At eight years old, he played his first concert and that by 11 years old, he was playing with much older players. And it was just this natural ability, but also this personality that he carried himself like a matador with this dignity,

the way he carried it, he appeared in uniform. He just, it almost seemed this is just his way of being and what really stood out as he continued throughout his career was just that the mannerism of how he carried himself as a person, as a ball player, just stood through. You know, it's interesting, now I'm editorializing again, as a ball player just stood through. You know, it's interesting, now I'm editorializing again, that so, Guilberto was journalist for many years. Martín was a professor of accounting for many years, the other son, I should say, that I know,

that both of them actually continued kind of this very dignified personas of, you know, very respectable. And that some people talked about Martín Diego as, you know, and Montal is not just like the immortal player, but just the way his way of being was so respectful and dignified. And that he also not just portrayed that, but it almost radiated from him onto others.

And so that the whole team would take on his persona. puso a mí de corredor emergente. Yo corría por él y yo le le vi dar unos batazos a muchachos, piches, claro, no eran profesionales, pero eran más jóvenes. Yo le vi dar un batazo de honrón que se llevó en otro terreno y cayó en la calle con más de 50 años. Es decir,

sin entrenamiento prácticamente todavía tenía la habilidad. and Gilberto would sometimes be the runner for him. And Martín would hit. But Martín would hit these long home runs, these batazos or like these blasts. And they would leave the ballpark where they're playing and carry over to the second field behind there, over that fence too.

And it was an amazing thing because he wasn't doing it with taking regular batting practice. He would just step back in there, face these young pitchers, and just blast away. But a brief summary of his career. We see that he had results in Cuba. Incredible results. Being the leader of the batting and the leader of the dancers. In addition, he was the leader in different departments. y líder de los lanzadores. En más ocasión fue líder en diferentes departamentos.

Si vamos a México, también fue en un momento líder de los bateadores y líder de los lanzadores. Si vamos a Venezuela, donde jugó con el equipo Concordia, creó ese equipo Concordia. Fue un equipo que prácticamente fue el anticipo de lo que era la Serie del Caribe, porque ese equipo jugaba en diferentes países de América Latina, beisbolera. Y ahí también tiene números también sobresalientes. of kind of the overall accomplishments of Martin Diego is that when we look at his stats, his records in Cuba, he was consistently ranked among the hitting leaders

and in various categories. And then you would look the same season at the pitching leaders and there you find again, Martin Diego, both in terms of regular season and then even in career-wise. And you go to the stats in Mexico, and again, you see Martin Diego listed among the hitting leaders, home runs and average and pitching leaders and wins and ERA. And that he also played in Venezuela with the Concordia team. And this was before the Caribbean World Series was put together. But

the Concordia team would travel out of Venezuela and play the top teams in Cuba, in the Dominican Republic, in Puerto Rico, and in Mexico. So, you know, he was competing again at that elite level throughout the Caribbean world, and again, setting a standard for everyone. Is there anything that you'd care to add to that, Adrian, from your own research and knowledge of the Negro Leagues and Caribbean Leagues, of sort of where he stacks up to the other legends and just how impressive his two-way performance was? So in doing research on the New York Cubans and the Cuban stars that Alex Pompez operated out of New York. You have a young Martin Diego, 18, 19 years old, competing for the home run record of the Negro Leagues with,

you know, 25, 30-year-old sluggers, you know, the best. And in talking to a few of the players I interviewed over the years who witnessed Martin Diego play, you know, is that he hit these, he hit the ball hard and they were like line drive bombs, you know, that were just legendary in how quickly they left the ballpark. You know, today we will head Velo speed and he would definitely be a high Velo guy. And the other thing was he very much was someone who was very confident in his abilities. And so there is this epic series between the Pittsburgh Crawfords and the New York Cubans where it goes down to the seventh game and my dean puts himself into pitch to try to close out this series. Unfortunately, the New York Cubans lose to

the Pittsburgh Crawfords. But it is, again, one of the epic battles of the Negro Leagues that anyone who appreciates the history of the Negro Leagues know that these were the elite players of black baseball gathered together. And for me to understand how Martine, I mean he it's mind-boggling to have today people talk about shohei otani and they're like amazed at his ability this was martin diego was playing shortstop regularly he would play center field he would play you know he would pitch he would take his turn at the bat and was constantly among the league leaders in hitting and for power. But he didn't have one position that throughout his career, he was constantly moving around as it best suited the team that day. And the ability to excel, you know, Otani, he's in right field.

He's on the mound. He's DHing. He's not going to take a turn at second base at short. Maybe he might in center field, but Diego was. And he was doing that at such a level that the other teams always planned around, where is Diego? Is he going to be on the mound today? Is he going to be batting third, fourth, fifth? Like, you have to game plan around Martin Diego.

And that he did that into his 40s. The love he had for the game was amazing. And I'll share one other story because I did research in the regional archives in San Fuegos. And someone who is a historian, I have never had the opportunity to watch Martin Diego play there is no video of him playing you got the oral history of players who saw him play but what I did get to see in the Municipal Archives in San Fuegos was a letter of my team Diego when he was serving in the Cuban

Ministry of Sport and it was him advocating for more equipment, more materials to help the youth in Villa Clara, which becomes absorbed into the province of San Fuegos. And I actually got to see, it was typewritten, but at the bottom, hand signed Martin Diego's signature. And as a historian, that's one of those things like, so I never got to see him play, escrito en el fondo, signado de Martín Diego. Y como historiador, es una de esas cosas.

Así que nunca lo vi jugar, pero lo vi escribir. jugó para decidir, esa fue su gran decepción, porque Charleston ya faltaba prácticamente un inning, y Charleston le dio un honrón, empataron el juego y luego perdió. Ese fue su gran dolor, no haber ganado porque se confió. Charleston, que además, Oscar Charleston, que además está en el Salón de la Fama. Y cuando tú miras esa liga negra donde jugó Martín Díaz, como tú bien dices, no solamente eran mayores que él, sino que la gran mayoría de esos jugadores están en el Salón de la Fama. Boog Leonard, Oscar Chaleston, S.H. Page.

Y con todos ellos, el único latino que se medía who measured himself equally in the Lomita in front of those launchers and those players was Martin Diego. So Gilberto brings us back to that 1935 series between the Pittsburgh Crawfords and the New York Cubans to note that Diego's one lament was, so he was on the mound in the eighth inning of that final game of the seven game series and Oscar Charleston hits a home run off him that ties it up and then they lose it in the ninth inning

to the Pittsburgh Crawfords. Now, this is what Gilberto wants us to remember, that Pittsburgh had Oscar Charleston, Buck Leonard, Satchel Page on that team. You had a number of guys who end up from that 35 squad in the Baseball Hall of Fame. Who's the one who basically is able to take the mound and pitch against them and take, you know, step into the batter box and compete on that level?

It's Martin Diego on the mound and in the batter's box, competing Hall of Fame, first group of Negro Leaguers into the Hall of Fame caliber player. And, you know, that is part of the reason why, when that veterans committee in Cooperstown, the Negro League committee, when they were putting people into the Hall of Fame and cool Papa gets in and Charleston and Buck Leonard and Martin Diego is the only Latino player who's included,

because he also competed at that level with all of them. that were not the same as the Americans. And yet, Papa Cool, Bob Leonard, all of them speak eloquently of Martin Diego in their memories. And he also says that, you know, of these great players, many of them don't just loud the greatness of other players. These African-American greats like Cole Papa Bell and Buck Leonard and Charleston, they all talk glowingly about Martin Diego. They all just glowed about his talent and his abilities that he played when he was playing against them. Roberto, I don't know whether you have watched Otani's career, but I wonder whether

that makes you think that we might see another player who could come along and do what your father did, or will we never see it again because he just did everything so well that it can't be replicated? de ver el jugador Shohei Otani su carrera y viendo como él juega si es posible que vamos a ver otro pelotero como Martín Diego o es algo que nunca jamás vamos

a ver alguien que puede jugar como Martín es difícil en la actualidad que exista, no por el talento porque puede tener el talento pero no puede tener el talento, pero no la oportunidad. El talento tal vez lo tenga, pero en grandes ligas es prácticamente imposible que alguien pueda jugar las nueve posiciones, que alguien pueda pichar hoy en día nueve innings, como pichaba Martín Digo, y que alguien pueda además pichar, salir del piche

y jugar otra posición no digo que alguien pueda tener ese talento pero no va a tener la oportunidad y Martín Digo por la coyuntura histórica que vivió tuvo esa oportunidad alguien y cuando tú miras

hay otros peloteros que también Baby Ruth fue p pitcher y despuésaba otra posición. Es decir, pero eso era por necesidad y la posibilidad que tuvieron en esa época. So he says it's difficult, not because players lack the talent. There are players who have the talent to be a pitcher and a leading hitter,

but the opportunity today's game is not there. The chance to pitch nine innings and then play, go to another position and keep playing the next day, they may have the talent, but it's the opportunity. Martin Diego played in an era where he had the opportunity to go and excel on the mound and be you know next day center field or whatever other position he was going to play and that there were other players in my team the Eagles era like Babe Ruth who was a

pitcher and then he he became a right fielder with the Yankees and bullet Joe Rogan who was a pitcher and then took other opportunities in the field and there was another Cuban player Lázaro Salazar who was a pitcher and then also was a everyday player as well it's not that Martin Diego had a different level of talent that no one else would be able to have that talent is that it's really hard in this day and era for a player to have the opportunity to do what Martin did during his era.

And he was so good at pitching and hitting, playing all over the field. Do you know if he had a favorite? Did he prefer to pitch or hit or a favorite position? And also, do you know if he had any special routine to maintain himself so that he could do all those things, so that he could pitch one day and then play in the field the next day

without hurting himself or being fatigued? The question is about if Martin Diego had a position that was his favorite to play in, and maybe if he had a routine of how to train era su favorito de jugar. Y tal vez, si él tenía una rutina de cómo entrenarse para mantenerse jugando hasta que estaba en los 40. Bueno, la posición que él, además de lanzar, pero que le encantaba, y es la que le digo a mi hijo además, mi hijo de 13 años que está jugando béisbol,

que le digo que esa es la posición que él debe jugar, es la de centenfield ¿por qué? porque en los outfield hay menos preocupación para batear solamente hay que tener buen brazo y saber capturar los fly, no es lo mismo que cuando

tú juegas en el infield que tienes más responsabilidades de cubrir la base, to do the double plays. In the outfield, the outfield players know that they only have to bat. That's their position. They know how to capture the flies, be fast and have good arms according to the outfield they play. He liked to be in the outfield. So his favorite position, in addition to being a pitcher on the field, and one that Aguilventos-Alzón plays currently, is playing center field.

That one really just has to concern themselves with catching the fly, you have a good arm, but that it's not all the responsibilities that you constantly have to think about in the field when you're an infielder, in terms of what plays and runners and all that, that you can really be campo cuando eres un infielder, en términos de qué juegas y qué jugadores y todo eso, que puedes ser un muy buen infielder, pero enfocarte un poco más pensando en tus atletas y sin esas responsabilidades del infielder. Así que sí, el centro del campo fue la posición que Martín Diego disfrutó.

¿Y sobre la rutina? La rutina era la misma que tenían todos aquellos jugadores es decir, Ramón Bragaña Cocaína García Lázaro Salazar cuando tú miras no solamente Martín Diego

por eso en mi programa trato de que en el programa de Martín Diego su fundación, los aficionados conozcan a estas personas, a estos jugadores que pichaban hoy dentro de dos días pichaban, Martín Digo no era una excepción, era la regla de lo que ocurría

en aquella época ellos cuando terminaba primero cuando entraban a pichar sabían que eran nueve innings si explotaba, muchos de ellos lo que hacían era seguir pichando la cantidad de lanzamientos que tenían que hacer para no dejar de hacer la cantidad de lanzamientos.

Eso sí salía, pero en el caso de Diego, muchas veces salía de piche y entraba en el Sion. Pero los otros, por ejemplo, Conrado Marrero, que jugó con los senadores de Washington. to be on the mound pitching and that their goal their their mindset was nine innings every time if they got they started getting hit hard that they would focus on a pitch throwing pitches that won't take a lot out of the arm and just get through and so the difference was is that Diego you know if he sometimes if he got hit hard he'd go from the mound to short or to center field you know he would actually sometimes pitch less than the nine innings and just go to another position.

A number of these other guys, they knew they had to take the nine innings. And so he started to talk a bit about Connie Marrero. Connie Marrero told me that, for example, when he went to the movies, he had his arm in the air conditioning. He put his arm in a coat so that the cold wouldn't affect him. When he slept, he tried not to sleep on his arm. iba al cine, había aire acondicionado, él ponía el brazo con un abrigo para que el frío no lo afectara. Cuando dormía, trataba de no dormir sobre su brazo. Martín Di Ivo, por ejemplo, era un hombre que

independientemente de eso, hacía las jugadas difíciles. La hacía fácil, por el talento que tenía. Muchos viejos aficionados me decían que había veces que le chiflaban, pero para otro jugador que era súper difícil, por ejemplo,

agarrar en el sior, en el hueco, él lo hacía fácil. Era un hombre de seis pies y pico. Es decir, estamos hablando un sior de aquella época, jugando sior, con el alcance que tenía, le llegaba a tazos que otro señor no le llegaba y así en primera así en los jardines, es decir

el talento que tenía lo ayudaba en muchas ocasiones a suplir determinada jugada pero ellos se preparaban con muy poco tiempo para poder cumplir los compromisos porque salían de un país y se iban para otro.

Él comparte una historia sobre Connie Marrero, que Connie Marrero le dijo que, por ejemplo, si iba al teatro de películas, siempre tenía una camisa en su brazo de pichar para que nunca se quedara frío, para que quedara caliente y suave. Nunca se pichaba en su brazo de dormir, always have a jacket on his pitching arm so that it would never get cold, so that it would stay warm and loose. He never pitched on his sleeping arm. He would, you know, on his back or on the other side so that, you know, his arm was always ready. Now, he also notes how with Martín Diego,

you had, like, there's an expression about, like, making all the plays look easy. And he had this ability because he was six feet tall. He was over six feet tall. And back then, you didn't have many shortstops that were over six feet tall. So he had to reach. He had the ability to make plays that others couldn't. And it was the same thing at first base or in center field. He stood out because of his height. And he would keep a training regimen of always being ready to play because these guys pretty much traveled all year y que mantuviera un régimen de entrenamiento de siempre estar listo para jugar, porque estos chicos viajaron todo el año, jugando el juego, y eso fue su vida, eso es lo que tenían que mantener en forma física para estar listos para jugar durante el año. bueno anotar de estos titanes, porque hay que llamarlo así, son gigantes estos jugadores de esa época,

no había medicina deportiva. Es decir, si lesionaban, ellos mismos tenían que buscar remedios caseros. Mi papá tenía un remedio, por ejemplo, de ponerse cuando terminaba, se ponía el brazo con una toalla caliente para mantener el brazo caliente. Se ponía a veces tabaco también en el brazo con una toalla caliente para mantener el brazo caliente. Se ponía a veces tabaco también en el brazo, tabaco. Unían el tabaco que era caliente y se lo ponían también en el brazo. Y eso les resultaba cuando tú ves los line up de los equipos en diferentes países. El mismo tipo que estaba en La Habana lo veía después en la Liga Negra y después lo veías en México y tú decías, oh my God, In different countries, the same guy who was in Havana, I saw him later in the Black League. And then I saw him in Mexico.

And you said, oh my God, what happened? How is this possible? So Gilberto notes that you have these titans of baseball. They're just superstar players. And that they had to keep themselves fit. They had to figure out how to take care of themselves. There wasn't sports medicine back then. And most teams didn't have a team doctor. They didn't have a trainer and the players had to figure out for themselves.

So my team, you know, one of his remedies was always having this hot towel on his, on his throwing arm to, to make sure it stays loose. Sometimes he would put tobacco on it because it will burn and it kind of, you know, probably works a little bit like Icy Hot to keep the arm loose. And that these guys would face each other in Cuba, then they played against each other in the Negro Leagues and they go down to Mexico and they would play

and they would see each other's like, oh my God, there he is again, you know? And that they're playing year round and they're playing at that high level. And so but they had to figure it out for themselves. There wasn't the advantage that current players do have in really having sports medicine. And, you know, today we have coaches that specialize in keeping, you know, conditioning that they had to do it for themselves. Sasha Spade says in his memory that he was throwing snake fat in his arm to do it for themselves. Satchel Paige says in his memory that he used to put snake fat in his arm to be able to pitch.

That's another example that he pitched today, tomorrow and the past. So you understand that these people had a different vision than the players of today. So he talks about Satchel Paige, who used what's called serpent oil, serpent grease, and put it on his arm to stay loose because he'll pitch today and he'll pitch tomorrow in another city and pitch the third day in a row and just travel. And that these players had to find their own remedies and ways of being always prepared to play during that era. And do you know what the motivation was? That if they didn't play, they wouldn't earn money.

It was as easy as that. If they didn't play, they wouldn't earn money. Unlike today, they have contracts, they get injured, and I'm not criticizing them, but they get injured, they have any injury, and they don't play anymore. So he notes, like, what was their motivation? You don't play, you don't get paid. And so you have to play in order to get paid.

And so that's why they figured out all these ways. And not to criticize today's players, they didn't have contracts back then. That, you know, a salary that took care of them. That today they have a salary and they can, you know, take care of their bodies a different way. But back then, you got to play in order to get paid. Okay. Well, before we go, Adrian, I guess I'll ask you, is there anything that we haven't touched on that you would want people to know about De Higo, either his career or who he was as a person or as a player or the larger legacy of Latino players in the Negro Leagues and beyond in the days when the color barrier was still in effect.

Martin Diego had a profound impact on Latino players, particularly players like Orestes Minoso, as he was known in Cuba before he became Mini Minoso here. Mini Minoso writes all the time as a youth that how he looked up to Martin Diego, he played for him, and that this was a role model, that Martín Diego was a role model for many Afro-Cuban players because of how he played and how he carried himself. That was just like the standard. And the best comparative person, I would say, to have that kind of prolific impact on a group of players is Roberto Clemente, that people want to live up to how Clemente stood as a figure. This was Martin Diego,

particularly within black baseball circles during the era of the color line. He was not just a great player. They saw him as the kind of person they want to learn how to behave like, how to carry themselves like. The consummate professional, the consummate person who cared about the other guy to make sure that all the players on the team were taken care of. And that we often lose sight of because we focus so much on the versatility of Martin Diego, and the versatility going from not just being a player, but also being a manager, and losing sight that as an individual person, he really had an impact on generations of Cuban players and other Negro League players because of how he carried himself in terms

of his personality. And Gilberto, do you have any last thoughts on your father as a player, as a person, anything that we have not talked about today? Any thoughts about his father as a person that we haven't talked about so far? If you want, a thought at the end for this program. como persona que no hemos hablado hasta ahora si quiere unos pensamientos al final para este programa. Te escuché hablando de Clemente que también fue

un gran jugador y un hombre altruista porque hay que recordar que Clemente perdió la vida tratando de ayudar a otras personas salvando esa distancia Martín Diego también fue otro jugador altruista. Yo he tenido la posibilidad de seguir

los pasos, las huellas de mi padre. En este sentido, yo viví en México, jugué en México. Yo fui corresponsal de un periódico en Venezuela, estuve en Venezuela, Puerto Rico, ni hablar todas las veces que estuve en Venezuela, Puerto Rico, ni hablar todas las veces que estuve, y finalmente en Estados Unidos.

Es decir, que de una manera u otra yo he seguido esa huella y he encontrado personas de diferentes nacionalidades que me hablaron del altruismo de Martín Díaz. Martín Díaz creó una asociación de jóvenes en México,

masones, para su desarrollo con su dinero. Gilberto notes that when I was talking about Clemente and his altruism that, yeah,

he recalls, you know, that his father, Martin Diego, was also an altruistic person and that Gilberto has had

the opportunity to kind of follow his father's footsteps in working in Mexico and working in Venezuela and traveling to Puerto Rico and now living in the United States. And that wherever Gilberto has lived and traveled, he's heard others talking about his father's altruism, his philanthropic endeavors. And that, for example, in Mexico, that Matin Diego had founded an organization for Mexican youth down there out of his own money. And I would add, remember, these guys weren't earning a lot of money. So to save and to create an organization to help others

was really ahead of his time and an important sign of the altruism and how Martin Diego was very much interested in helping others, not just on the playing field by entertaining them, but beyond the playing field. I forgot about the Dominican Republic, because if my wife listens to me, she'll kill me, because I'm married from the Dominican Republic. And if he doesn't, he might have some trouble at home.

su esposa es de la República Dominicana y si lo hace, puede tener un poco de problemas en casa. Pero, de nuevo, hay otro lugar en el que Martín Diego tuvo un impacto profundo. Y así, el legado que vive. Entonces, en todos estos países, siempre encontré personas que me hablaban de su generosidad. En México encontré un señor ya mayor

que cuando niño, ese señor que era niño, mi papá le pagó la matrícula de la escuela y así sucesivamente tenía. Y una de las cosas que fue para Cuba, es decir, regresó a Cuba cuando triunfó la revolución de Castro, fue porque creía que en una revolución que iba a cambiar una con el racismo y otra iba a dar un paso democrático. Es decir, mi papá no fue comunista, fue socialista y ya atrapado ahí ya no salió. Pero ahí te das cuenta de esa visión humana que tuvo Martín Digo y es lo que trato de reflejar en el libro.

Dicho sea de paso, también hice otro libro que se llama Estrellas por Siempre con 40 semblanzas de 40 peloteros de esa época, porque es necesario que los aficionados de América Latina, porque está en español, tal vez lo pongan en inglés, conozcan no solamente a Martín Digo, sino a todos estos jugadores Latin America, because it is in Spanish, maybe put it in English, know not only Martin Diego, but all these players who made a time and opened the routes of Latin American baseball. So in everywhere that Gilberto has lived and traveled to, in all these countries, they talk of Martin Diego's generosity.

in all these countries, they talk of Martín Diego's generosity. He recalls meeting an older person, older man, when Gilberto met him, who knew Martín as a young person and that Martín had played the tuition, the school tuition. So that person, that man could, as a young boy, could attend school. And that also it's important to note that when the revolution happened in Cuba in 59, that Martin returned to Cuba, and his his goal was to help the Cuban people. His belief in the revolution was that it was going to end racism to address the problem of race in Cuba to address other issues that were ongoing in Cuba in that era, that Martin

Diego was very much a committed socialist. He believed in those set of ideas, but he was not a communist. And yet he remained in Cuba because that was his land, that was his people, and he was committed to the people of Cuba. And that Gilberto has also written another book because while people know about Martin Diego, Gilberto has also written another book because while people know about Martín Diego, Gilberto also wants people to understand that in this book, Estrella por Siempre, Forever Stars, he has the stories of 40 other players from the era that Martín Diego played so that the youth, the young fans of the game, fans of the game in general, know these players and understand the path that they created of opportunity

for other players who would follow them. Well, this was wonderful to talk to you and to learn about Martine. And I will link to Adrian's books and I will link to Gilberto's books for anyone who wants more information. And you can find Gilberto on Twitter at GDHigo. You can also find Adrian on Twitter at ADBurgosJr. Thank you so much, Gilberto. Muchas gracias.

Fue un placer hablar contigo. También me puedes encontrar en YouTube en Fórmula Diego, donde sale el programa Martín Diego y su fundación, en el canal Fórmula Diego formula so you can also find him on youtube on the channel formula the eagle and that they're uh talking also about the uh foundation martin diego and so you know he's all over social media so you can get to know more about martin diego and his impact across baseball. And Adrian, thank you very much for sharing your knowledge and also for translating, which

I know is not easy. It must have been a test of your note-taking and short-term memory. So thank you. Thank you for having me on. I thank you very much, much. I'm sorry for my poor English, because I talk for my father. My poor English, because I talk for my father, it's necessary for me.

It speaks good for the audience. Listen, it's very important for Martín Diego, for the baseball, not only in Cuba, see, only in America. Yes, thank you. Okay, thank you both. Appreciate it. Un placer.

Thank you, Ben and Riberto. Un placer. Thank you. All right, that will do it for today. Un placer. Thank you, Ben and Roberto. Un placer. Thank you. All right, that will do it for today. Thanks for listening. Hope you enjoyed the interview. Thanks for bearing with the unusual format. I know it takes longer to have it in two languages, but it felt like the right way to do justice to Diego's legacy and to respect Gilberto's time and also make the conversation accessible to Spanish speakers who may not speak English. And on Monday night, Shohei Otani, who went three for five, hit a Di Higo-esque double, 119 miles per hour. That is the hardest hit ball since Giancarlo Stanton hit a home run harder last July. And Otani is now one of five players who have hit a ball that hard in a major league game

that was tracked by StatCast, the Yankees trio of Stanton, Aaron Judge, and Gary Sanchez, and Nelson Cruz, and now Otani. And the new ball does seem to have goosed exit speed slightly, but that ball was crushed, so DiHigo would have approved. Maybe in the future we can do segments on the other Negro League's two-way greats. I actually took a nap a little bit before that interview, and I had a nightmare that I slept too long and I missed it. Just a glimpse into the podcaster psyche there. I was quite relieved to wake up and discover that I still had time to talk to Gilberto and Adrian. You still have time to support Effectively Wild on Patreon by going to patreon.com slash effectively wild. The following five listeners have already signed up and pledged some small monthly amount to help keep the podcast

going and get themselves access to some perks. Rob Fibbs, Jason George, Sean Hogan, Greg Powell, and Michael Stevens. Thanks to all of you. You can join our Facebook group at facebook.com slash groups slash Effectively Wild. You can rate, review, and subscribe to Effectively Wild on iTunes and Spotify and other podcast platforms. Keep your questions and comments for me and Meg coming via email at podcast.fangraphs.com or via the Patreon messaging system if you are a supporter. We intend to get to emails next time. Thanks to Dylan Higgins, as always, for his editing assistance.

And we will be back with another episode a little later this week. Talk to you then. Can't you feel it's your hometown hero's home, babe? You almost taste it, the whole town's amazing. Through your man, his own parade. You crack one face at a pirate's game. They don't care who you are, they just put you away. Can't you feel it, that hometown spirit is home, babe

Oh, it's Independence Day