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Coming Soon: Baseball from the Caribbean – La Serie Del Caribe

CABO ROJO, PR – Next week on February 1st – 9th, 2024; Miami, Florida will once again be teaming with Latin American baseball fans as they will host this years Serie Del Caribe. The games will be played at the Marlins LoanDepot park. This year will count on the championship teams of Venezuela, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Panama, Nicaragua and Curaçao. Columbia and Cuba who participated last year will not participate in this years tournament.

The Serie del Caribe (Caribbean Series) is an annual baseball tournament played by the professional baseball teams from the Caribbean and Latin America. The series is normally played in February, after the various countries winter leagues have ended their national tournaments.

The series is like a Latin American World Baseball Series as it incorporates different Latin American countries playing for a trophy, they can bring back to their countries for bragging rights. It’s like being in a scaled down version of MLB’s World Baseball Classic, but only of Latin American countries.

USA vs. Cuba in 2023 WBC Semifinals – Image Credit: World Baseball Classic/MLB

This Latin American baseball competition was the brainchild of a Venezuelan baseball entrepreneur,  Pablo Morales and Oscar Prieto Ortiz, who devised the idea after seeing the success of the now extinct Serie Interamericana in 1946, which featured the clubs Brooklyn Bushwicks from the United StatesCervecería Caracas from Venezuela, Sultanes de Monterrey from Mexico, and an All-Star team composed of Cuban players.

Inspired by that Serie Interamericana and his experience as a former president of the International Baseball Federation, Morales joined Prieto and presented the idea to baseball representatives of Cuba, Panama, and Puerto Rico during a meeting held in Havana, Cuba on August 21, 1948. The representatives then agreed to stage a four-country, round robin tournament 12-game to be known as the Serie del Caribe, to be launched in Cuba from February 20-25, 1949.

The Series ran annually from 1949 through 1960, with Cuba winning seven times. However, the event was cancelled after the Cuban government dissolved all professional baseball in Cuba in 1961. It was not until 1970 that the Caribbean Series was revived. Moreover, the 1981 Caribbean Series was not held due to a Venezuelan League player’s strike.

The tournament featured the champions of Mexico, Venezuela, Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico. Cuba returned in 2014. Panama returned to host the 2019 edition. Columbia was added for the 2020 edition, replacing Cuba who could not participate due to visa issues. Curacao was invited as a guest in 2023.

Dominican Republic has won the most Caribbean Series championships (23), with Tigres del Licey being the most successful team in the tournament’s history. The series has been won by 28 teams from seven different countries. Only two teams have won the tournament two years in a row, the most recent being Criollos de Caguas from Puerto Rico in 2017–18.

Latino Sports will be present in Miami to bring our readers some of the action, excitement, and stories that we believe our readers would like to know.

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