Baseball is in mourning after the death of the historic Panamanian and former New York Yankee, Héctor López, at 93 years, as announced by his son, Darrol. The former baseball player lived in Florida with his wife Claudette since 1992.
López made baseball history by become the first Afro-Latino manager to manage in the Minor Leagues when he took over the Buffalo Bisons in 1966, who at that time belonged to to the Washington Senators. At that time the manager of the big team was the historic Ted Williams.
The Panamanian was also the third member of the well-known Yankees gardens, also made up of Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris, who won the World Series consecutively in the years 1961 Y 1962.
Héctor López became the second Panamanian to debut in the Major Leagues, when the 12 May 1961 was fielded by the Kansas City Athletics, just 13 days after his compatriot Humberto Robinson became the first born in Panama to reach the Major Leagues.
It should be noted that, although López was the first black person he coached in the Minor Leagues, there was someone who did it before but in the Major Leagues, it is about Frank Robinson who debuted as manager of the Cleveland team in 1975.
The Latin American experienced one of the most memorable moments of his career, nothing more and nothing less than in the World Series of 1961 when he drove five of the 13 runs the Yankees made to defeat the Reds in Game 5. He finished this series with seven RBIs and an OPS of 1,343.
López was only manager of the Bisons for one season in which they had a negative record of 58-78. Later he directed the farms between 1994 and 1995 , when he was already living in Florida.
López was one more participant frequent at Yankees Legends Days, attending more than 13 annual events from 1966.
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