MIAMI, FL– One of our other tasks during this Spring training and World Baseball Classic games is to interview and get the thoughts of the 37 Latino baseball players who are on this year’s LatinoMVP ballot. This is the largest number of players ever to appear on the official ballot. As such, we are proud that MLB has stepped in and will be helping to get the thoughts on many of the Latino players in this year’s ballot.
As customary the awards are for the previous season as we never wanted to mix our award with the end of season awards given to all baseball players. We believed that would have been counterproductive as our awards would not get the attention they deserved. In addition, we believe that giving our awards during Hispanic Heritage Month would be best for all parties, the player, the teams, MLB, and Latino Sports.
The first player I was able to speak to was, NY Mets shortstop, Francisco Lindor. Francisco was in the middle of batting practice but took the time to greet me and share his thoughts with me on being nominated for another LatinoMVP award. Lindor had first won the award for his 2016 season.
When I congratulated him for once again appearing on the ballot, he said, “That’s great to hear. I look forward to winning again and getting the award in Citi-Field would be great.”
David “Big Papi” Ortiz was near him, and I motioned over to him and said that perhaps he can be like Ortíz who had won it a few times. Lindor turned looked at me and smiled.
