BASEBALL

The Baseball in Mexico began in the second half of the XIX century, and in 1925 began the establishment of a professional league. This is according to recent surveys the third most popular sport in Mexico.

Beginning

Several cities are vying for the distinction of having hosted the first baseball game in Mexico:

Xalapa, Veracruz

It was probably in the Park "The Watercress" where, in late April 1847, American invader army soldiers played the first baseball game in Mexico, using the prosthetic leg ("wooden leg") of Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna who had captured days earlier at the Battle of Cerro Gordo.

Guaymas, Sonora

The story goes that in 1877 the American sailors who formed the crew of the American ship Montana, visiting Guaymas, stepped on Mexican land and played a baseball game between them. Other boats, like Newborne, did the same and soon formed a baseball team in Guaymas.

Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas

Being border with the state of Texas in the United States, during the construction of the railway in the state of Tamaulipas, Johnny Tayson-an American who supervised the works and new sport-practiced, began teaching among workers, forming two baseball teams to be enfrentasen, also in 1877. At the border was easy exchange and Mexican teams had the opportunity to play against American teams.

Moreover, also in Yucatan soon the game was known because of its proximity to Cuba. It counts as a fact that in 1890 reached Yucatan Spanish corvette Barcelona in the family traveling Fernando Urzais. Among the toys of the children had a bat and a baseball, sport and popular in Cuba and the boys practiced on arrival. On the Yucatan Peninsula from Cuba arrived several clubs that were on tour.

Nuevo Leon is one of the entities that have claimed to be the original site of baseball in Mexico, giving the date as July 4, 1889, during the construction of the highway Monterrey-Tampico under the supervision of Treadwell Ayres Robertson, who gave day off to their employees who started playing baseball in a field adjacent to the railway works.

In Mexico City from 1887 the birth of the "Mexican Club" which is considered the country's oldest team.

Question

- When did baseball start in Mexico?

- Why suddenly the game became known in Yucatan?- What team was considered the oldest of Mexico?- Reasons why Mexican teams had the opportunity to play with the

Americans?