By Juan Montoya
You remember him as an outstanding second-baseman and shortstop with the Pace High School Vikings.
But unlike many outstanding athletes over the years, Héctor Javier Garanzuay Rodríguez has gone onto live the dream many would-be Major League players can only fantasize about. He is playing major league baseball in Mexico with the Acereros de Monclova. Over the last eight years, he has played semi-pro and pro baseball with a number of teams in the U.S. and in Mexico.
And, thanks to a sympathetic fellow athlete Brownsville City Manager Charlie Cabler, Hecotr was able to get a six-month leave of absence form his position as an animal control officer.
So if you see more stray dogs running around the city, don't blame his immediate supervisors who didn't want to be shorthanded by and denied him the leave.
Garanzuay, now 32, is a southpaw who throws and bats left and after Pace, attended and played for Texas A&M in Corpus Chrisiti and later for UT Brownsville (1999-2002). From there he transferred to Texas A&M and hit .379 in 2003, 7th among NCAA Division I Independents and ahead of Ryan Braun and Gaby Sanchez.
Undrafted, he signed with the Edinburg Roadrunners and hit very respectable .290/.358/.358 in 2004 while playing shortstop. In 2005, Garanzuay batted .302/.391/.433 for his hometown Monclova Steelers, with more walks (45) than strikeouts (38). Héctor split 2006 between the Coastal Bend Aviators .176/.232/.176 in 14 G) and Monclova (.331/.408/.497, 12 HR).Garanzuay fell to .293/.357/.416 with 28 doubles for the 2007 Steelers. He played for Mexico in the 2007 Baseball World Cup, hitting .375/.394/.438 while mostly being used at DH in their 6-4 win over the host Taiwan National Team in the 7th/8th place game.
In 2008, Garanzuay hit .277/.357/.397 with 13 steals in 18 tries for Monclova. He hit .318/.375/.508 with 23 doubles after 62 games in 2009.
After eight seasons, his batting average stands at a respectable .287.
It's no wonder Cabler, who dabbles in fastpitch softball along with aging wonder player Pete Avila his sidekick, would let Hector take a six-month breather in Monclova to make a few extra bucks and continue to dream of playing in the majors. But does this mean that the city is going to the dogs while Hector is in his field of dreams?
9 comments:
Congratulations to Hector. A southpaw playing shortstop? That's unbelievable.
We have a lot of talented people in this area. Unfortunately, the culture of "La Jaiba" causes us to focus on the negative, and we lose track of young people like this. Another reason we don't know about them is that they go away to reach there goals and their successes are seldom reported here.
If you know baseball, you know that prior to the 70’s baseball players did not make the salaries of today’s ballplayers. Major league ballplayers needed to have a second job during the baseball off-season in order to support their families. Their communities provided jobs to their local baseball heroes knowing that they represented their community in the world of baseball.
Helping a young man like Hector reach his goal is something for our community to be proud to do. Charlie should be commended for assisting this young man in reaching his goal. Maybe someday we will see a local boy from Brownsville, Texas playing in the Majors.
Thanks Charlie for supporting your employees!
It is so sad that the City has spent more than 30 million in the sport park y para nada.
How many Millions Spawnlass (Capistrano) is getting from the City, County, BISD, the Port?
CABLER,GET WILLY GONZALEZ BACK TO WORK,IS OK TO FIRE A GUN AND NOT GET ARRESTED, AND MR. MONTOYA WHAT HAPPEN WITH THIS GUY...IS HE IN JAIL OR RETIRED FROM CITY OF BROWNSVILLE WITH ALL THE BENEFITS.
What sucks is that they are holding that position for this guy to play ball.....while others are looking for a job.....and what about his fellow workers? They pick up his slack? Or do they get to take extended vacations also?
DID CABLER GOT WILLY GONZALEZ BACK TO WORK?
IS IT OK TO FIRE A GUN AND NOT GET ARRESTED?
WHO IS THE RELATIVE THAT IS PROTECTING WILLY?
WHAT HAPPEN TO WILLY, IS HE IN JAIL OR RETIRED FROM CITY OF BROWNSVILLE WITH ALL THE BENEFITS?
Where did you get your education?
All i have to say is, they need to be fair to all employees. Just because he is a pro-baseball player? I hope they can accomadate other employees city wide for any other reasons (personal reasons, sick reasons) accomodating them to keep their job. Not because they are superstars. This isnt hollywood. We live in reality.
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