List of Major League Baseball Players From Puerto Rico - Historical Performance and Regulations

Historical Performance and Regulations

Baseball was introduced to Puerto Rico by immigrants during the nineteenth century. The first sanctioned baseball game in the island was played on January 9, 1898 in Santurce, Puerto Rico, where two teams composed of Puerto Rican, American and Cuban players participated. After this game, baseball became a widespread sport and professional and amateur leagues were organized. During this time period, the Puerto Rico national teams experienced success on international competition and Afro-Puerto Rican players began to participate in the Negro Leagues.

The first player born in Puerto Rico who played in MLB was Hiram Bithorn, who debuted as a pitcher with the Chicago Cubs on April 15, 1942. This was followed by the introduction of African American players in Major League Baseball, which allowed more chances to players born in the island. Subsequently Afro-Puerto Rican players such as Orlando Cepeda and Victor Pellot began having solid performances in the league, and were selected to participate in the Major League Baseball All-Star Game. In 1973, Roberto Clemente became the first player from Puerto Rico and first Latin American to be elected as a member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. Since then Puerto Rico has kept a stable amount of players in the league. During this timeframe, several players have been selected to participate in the All-Star Game or won awards for their performance, while others imposed records within the league. These include Javy López, who holds the record for most home runs hit by a catcher in a single season. Both Iván Rodríguez and Roberto Alomar hold the record for most Gold Glove Awards in their positions. Recipients of the Most Valuable Player Award include Orlando Cepeda, Juan González and Iván Rodríguez. Roberto Clemente and Mike Lowell also won the World Series MVP Award in their respective divisions. Carlos Delgado is the only Latin to hit 4 homers in a game.

Originally, players who were either born or naturalized in Puerto Rico were able to sign with MLB teams as free agents, usually receiving minor-league contracts prior to their debut in the league. In 1989, Major League Baseball decided to include the island in the list of jurisdictions within the United States, which made mandatory that first-year players include their name in the Major League Baseball Draft in order to receive a contract. This was based on an initiative that was supposed to create a national and international drafting system. The change reduced the amount of players that were able to participate in the league, by limiting the number of them selected by the teams; this led to the island's Secretary of Recreation and Sports, to formally ask to Major League's involvement in developing specialized schools to produce more players and other measures to reduce the impact of the draft's implementation. The original proposal included Puerto Rico's exclusion of the draft for a period of ten years, but this was not approved by the league.

Puerto Rico was one of sixteen teams to participate in the inaugural edition of the World Baseball Classic. The tournament was created by Major League Baseball, the Major League Baseball Players Association, and other professional baseball leagues and their players associations around the world, including the Puerto Rican Professional Baseball League. The first event was organized in 2006, and was sanctioned by the International Baseball Federation. The Hiram Bithorn Stadium in San Juan, Puerto Rico served as one of the venues for the first and second rounds. The stadium also hosted 22 Montreal Expos home games in 2003, after the league decided to relocate the team to San Juan as part of an experiment to "globalize" baseball. During the series there was an average attendance of 14,222.