Omar Vizquel Falls From Grace

Today is the birthday of Omar Vizquel, born in Caracas, Venezuela, 1967.

Over his 24 years in baseball, Vizquel won 11 Gold Gloves and set records for the most double plays at shortstop and the highest career fielding percentage at the position. Yet his achievements have been overshadowed by how he conducted himself after he retired from the game.

Baseball-obsessed from a young age, Vizquel played with balls made of adhesive tape and guava sticks for bats. At just ten years old, he helped his team win the 1977 Little League Baseball World Series. Later, he joined the Seattle Mariners minor league system, and eventually reached the big leagues in 1989.

While he wasn’t a superstar at the plate, his fielding won him admiration in the clubhouse and the cities he played for. On April 22, 1993, he made a barehanded grab to throw out Ernest Riles at first — securing the final out and preserving Chris Bosio’s no-hitter. In Game Six of the 1997 World Series, Vizquel made a heroic diving stop to throw out Charles Johnson, preventing two runs from scoring.

But his excellence on the field did not carry into his life off of it. In 2020, reports of domestic abuse emerged from his ex-wife. A year later, Vizquel and the White Sox were sued by a batboy who alleged he was sexually harassed by the player-turned-minor league manager.

The harassment case against Vizquel was settled out of court. While his stats and records remain, his Hall of Fame hopes are all but gone — he now lives in a kind of unofficial exile from the sport he loved.

Sleep Angels, Train Wrecks, and Diamond Heroics

• $9,000 In This Economy? – MASN, the Orioles regional TV network charged some fans who paid for what they thought was the $89.99 price tag for the new streaming service. Instead, they were charged $8,999.

• From Snapping Bats to Snapping Pics – Ken Griffey Jr. made some headlines recently, snapping photos at The Masters. The NYT sat down with the Hall of Famer to talk about some of his favorite shots. He’s not the only late-‘90s — early-00’s player to pick up a camera. Randy Johnson’s pretty nice with the glass as well.

• Do Angels Sleep? – Well, these ones don’t. The Angels organization schedules games before travel later in the day — making it so they get to the next city not long before the game starts, and after not sleeping much at all. Players hate it. The front office? They don’t have much of a response.

• Train wreck – How does baseball avoid brutal collisions like the one Padres first baseman Luis Arráez suffered this past Sunday? Some say the ‘two base solution’ — a change that would utilize two first bases — one for the runner, and one for the fielder. Padres manager Mike Shildt says he’s not opposed.

• Diamond Heroics – Cody Bellinger is too smooth in center field. Wilson Contreras goes swimming along the base path. Juan Soto fires one in to home to get Castellanos out.

April 24, 2025

Happy Birthday, American League

• 1901 — The American League begins its first official season. The league, having declared itself a major league, opens play with games in Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, and Washington. The Chicago White Stockings (later White Sox) defeat the Cleveland Blues 8–2 in the first game of this new era.