The most complete Cuban player in the Major Leagues

By Yasel Porto

Many fans and journalists like comparisons between players even if they do not coincide in time, an issue that undoubtedly makes the parallels that can be established in this regard enormously complex. Circumstances and different conditions in almost all aspects is something that conspires when it comes to making an analysis sufficiently fair and deep to determine who obtains the condition of superiority.

However, there is a category in which a large percentage of people have no doubt to point to a certain player as the best of all time. Despite even the fact that almost no one of us who live in this world today saw him perform in his many facets.

But when the most complete player that Cuba has had is mentioned, the first name that comes to mind is that of Martín Magdaleno Dihigo Llanos, able to transcend as a hitter, pitcher, defender of various positions, manager and even sportswriter. Not for pleasure he became the first Cuban to be inducted into the Cooperstown Hall of Fame (1977) and he also belongs to four other campuses, including Cuba. No one in the world has achieved such merit.

Until last year Dihigo had against him that in his active stage racism prevented him from going beyond the Negro Leagues within the United States but with the officialization of these extinct circuits in the fifties as part of MLB, the man Nicknamed “The Immortal” can be considered as one of the most complete “big leaguers” that have ever existed. And I speak in a general way, not only framed in the Cuban environment.

Several of the most notable North American players of the 1930s and 1940s publicly stated that there was no more comprehensive baseball player in the world than the native of Limonar, Matanzas, and the best proof of Dihigo’s impact was that he was one of the first of race. black who received the ticket to be part of the exclusive Hall and Museum of Fame of the nation that created and that best developed the ball.

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Of the defensive positions, catching was the only one in which he did not have a leading role, while combining an offensive solidity with an extreme dominance on the mound that only two other men have been able to handle with such stellarity. None other than Babe Ruth and Shohei Ohtani.

Dihigo went as far as being a batting and pitching champion the same year, and to top it all, directing his own season with the collective title at the end of it. That happened in Mexico and Cuba, while in the United States, although he did not coach, he was the natural leader of the teams in which he was also the leading figure in sports.

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The greatness of “The Master,” as his plaque in Cooperstown points out, touched people so deeply that even generations who did not directly enjoy it repeat without hesitation what is stated in the title of this article.

But it has also been a source of inspiration to carry out different literary and artistic works. Two very complete biographies, one of them of his countryman Alfredo Santana along with multiple writings and chronicles while he lived and after his death in 1971, added to various paintings by the painter Reynerio Tamayo and the presence in Cuban theater and cinema. And to this also add the exclusivity of being the only Cuban player whose name identifies two stadiums on the Island (Cruces and Triunvirato), plus the rock with the most internet activity capable of making important contributions to Cuban baseball.

And of course, in the inexhaustible range of initiatives of all kinds in honor of Don Martín, the making of one of the best sports documentaries that has been produced in Cuba cannot be missed. With the authorship of Cubavisión Internacional and Prensa Latina journalist Yodenis Massó, the work takes an excellent journey through Dihigo’s life using attractive techniques to graph photos, videos and newspaper clippings. We must also highlight the contribution of expeloteros and historians together with the successful use of music and even the poetry of Nicolás Guillén that serves as an ideal culmination to close.

This documentary belongs today to the collection on Cuban baseball of the Hall of Fame of the United States, and in Cuba it received multiple recognitions at the time of its premiere in 2013, in addition to a very favorable reception by specialists and fans in general.

In itself, dealing with a figure like Dihigo already anticipated success, and if that is added what was accomplished by the director and that I mentioned above, they allow this audiovisual tribute to come closer to the magnitude and significance of the man that many will continue to hold has been the The most complete Cuban player who has passed through the Major Leagues and in history in a more global sense.