2024-07-09 20:30:39
Text: Cuba News 360 Editorial Team
Photos: RL Hevia
Although the National Series are far from their golden years, for the most faithful fans of the island’s national pastime, a classic between Industriales and Santiago de Cuba will continue to be a dish to be enjoyed with pleasure. For example, the semifinals of last season when both teams met again in the postseason after 15 years and the stadiums of both provinces were packed.
This week, the Latinoamericano will be dressed up to host another edition of this historic confrontation between the most successful and followed teams in the country. And as the icing on the cake, the sub-series of five challenges comes with the added incentive of being played in the middle of the final stretch of the qualifying phase of the current 63 Series.
At least coaches Guillermo Carmona and Eddy Cajigal can breathe easy knowing they are comfortably in the playoff qualifying zone, but even so, neither of them will be careless knowing that a sweep could be costly with eight games left in the regular season.
The Lions from the capital are in sixth place with 37 wins and 20 losses, tied with Ciego de Ávila, while the Wasps are two places above them, in fourth place, thanks to 39 wins and only 18 losses. However, on Sunday, after the fifth match, these positions may well change.
Another match that will attract many attention starting this Tuesday will take place at the Capitán San Luis, when the Granma team, third with 43-24, will test the defenses of the host team from Pinar del Río (44-23), the new leaders of the championship since April.
If the Industriales versus Santiago de Cuba match is an attractive one due to the morbidity and history that surrounds it, the Alazanes and Vegueros match will bring together the best batting teams in the tournament, vastly superior in terms of power to the rest of the participating teams.
A single example supports this thesis: while the westerners exhibit the whopping number of 80 home runs, led by their lethal trio of Alexei Ramirez (14), William Saavedra (14) and Yasser Julio González (15), the easterners add 77, with Alfredo Despaigne leading not only the team, but the entire Series, with 18.
With about twenty fewer home runs, they are followed by Las Tunas (58), Matanzas (57) and Santiago de Cuba (54), the only other three teams to surpass fifty balls bounced out of the parks.
The champion Lumberjacks (40-22) and the Matanzas Crocodiles (35-22) are among the group that should also make an appearance in the playoffs without complications. Armando Ferrer’s team may be the ones that should make a little more effort this week against the ailing Camagüey (30-37) to finalize their passage.
The Las Tunas, on the other hand, could end up burying the aspirations of Artemisa (32-35), which is clinging to the last playoff spot in dispute with Guantánamo (32-35) and Sancti Spíritus (33-34).