Armando Capiró Lafferté

Cuban baseball player, six-time amateur baseball world champion and three-time Pan American and Central American titleholder.

Armando Capiró was born in the town of Santiago de las Vegas, in Havana. He began playing baseball at nine years of age while attending primary school.

He participated in several National School Games, in which he demonstrated his virtues as a batter. In his early years he played in various infield positions, some as different as first base and shortstop, although he also performed as a pitcher, fundamentally because of the velocity of his throws with his right arm.

He was part of the Boyeros team selection, from Havana, in provincial championships, and in the youth leagues he made up the Industriales team. Among his first coaches was the experienced professor and former baseball player Juan Ealo, who refined his shortcomings in the batter's box.

Due to the quality he displayed, in 1965 he reached the National Baseball Series (SNB) as a member of the Occidentales team.

As a pitcher he had only one appearance in relief against the Las Villas team, working for three innings to preserve his team's success, with three strikeouts included. But his great results in baseball came as an outfielder and batter. In fact, on his first official at-bat in the National Series he hit a home run against left-hander Manuel Rojas, from the Centrales team. This would be one of the traits that characterized him: his great batting strength, along with his efficient defense of left field.

In the XII National Series (1969-1970), Capiró had an outstanding performance, especially offensively, which earned him the right to be part of his country's pre-selection for the two most important events of the year: the Central American and Caribbean Games, to be held in Panama, and the Baseball World Championship, which would be in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia.

At the Panama City event—his first international competition—Capiró made contributions to the undefeated victory of the Cuban team. He was very efficient offensively, finishing with an excellent average of .579, the result of 11 hits in 19 official at-bats. Such performance left him included in the starting lineup for the world championship in Cartagena, months later, in which Cuba retained the crown achieved in 1969 in a similar tournament in the Dominican Republic.

In total, the sturdy Cuban player participated in six Amateur Baseball World Championships. To the already mentioned Cartagena were added those of Havana (1971), Managua (1972), Havana (1973), Cartagena (1976) and Parma (1978), in which he always won the gold medal, standing out for his formidable batting, especially long-distance hits, and his accurate throws from the outfields to the various bases. In the Nicaraguan capital he led in runs batted in (22). In total, he averaged in those world events .339 offensively (81 hits in 239 times at bat), and hit 11 home runs, with 60 runs batted in and 63 runs scored.

On the international stage he also had achievements in three Pan American Games—those of Cali, Colombia (1971), Mexico City (1975) and San Juan, Puerto Rico (1979)—and the same number of Central American and Caribbean Games: Panama (1970), Santo Domingo (1974) and Medellín, Colombia (1978), in teams representing his country where other power hitters such as Luis Giraldo Casanova stood out. In continental competitions, two timely home runs by Capiró have gone down in history: the one that decided the final game against the United States in Mexico (1975), and the one that tied sensationally in San Juan (1979), with a grand slam against Venezuela. In those events Capiró averaged .412 in batting (77 hits in 185 times at bat), with 16 doubles, four triples and 14 home runs; he drove home 64 teammates and scored in 58 opportunities.

Armando Capiró devoted himself entirely to the practice of baseball, favored by his powerful arm, especially in throws to home plate, and by the enormous power of his wrists to make the pitchers' throws disappear. He was feared and admired when he stepped up to home plate. In the 1970s he was part of a luxury trio with Agustín Marquetti and Pedro Medina, in the various capital teams he represented.

During his time in fourteen National Baseball Series he wore, in addition to the Occidentales uniform, those of the Metropolitanos, Habana and Industriales teams. He is still remembered for being the first to reach one hundred home runs in national tournaments, when wooden bats were used and the island's pitchers had ample reputation. In the defensive aspect he also achieved primacy. In left field, the position he played most—although he also occasionally played in right field and center field—he committed very few errors and his rivals always respected him in base running because of his formidable arm.

He was the first player to hit more than twenty home runs in a National Series, which happened in the twelfth edition (1972-1973), where he hit 22 home runs, breaking the record of 19 that had been set three years earlier by another celebrated player, Agustín Marquetti. He led in runs batted in (51) with the Industriales team in 1971, and for two seasons with Havana, he finished at the top of that important category by driving in 74. He obtained other leadership positions in the 1977 campaign, with the Metropolitanos team, finishing first in hits (52) and in triples (7). Furthermore, he set a record for consecutive games played in National Series (368).

In 1979 he underwent surgery for a knee injury. Nevertheless, he had good performance in the next National Series, and also in the 1980 Select Series. Despite being called up to the national pre-selection and participating successfully in its training and preparation, he did not make the national team for the World Championship in Tokyo, Japan. A controversial sanction that prevented him from continuing to play in the following years, and other injuries to his legs, accelerated his retirement from active baseball. At forty years of age, Capiró participated in the 1988 Provincial Series, in which he hit fourteen home runs and finished with very good averages, both offensive and defensive, but the disciplinary commission in Havana deemed him no longer fit to be part of the Industriales or Metropolitanos squads in national tournaments.

Thus Armando Capiró went into retirement, having in fourteen official National Series recorded 1,177 hits, 186 doubles, 47 triples and 162 home runs; he drove in 677 runs and scored 609. He achieved a .298 batting average and closed with batting power close to .500 slugging (.492). He demonstrated that he was a fast runner, managing to steal 48 bases from rival catchers, and was caught stealing 32 times. He received 496 walks—of which 111 were intentional—and struck out only 348 times in 3,948 times at bat, something significant for a power hitter.

He was one of the rare athletes who had two formal retirements: the first in 1989, in his native Santiago de las Vegas, during the celebration of a Provincial Championship, and the second months later, in an official ceremony of the National Series, held at Estadio Latinoamericano, the scene of many of his tremendous hits. In the early years of his retirement he worked as a coach, on the grounds of the Psychiatric Hospital of Havana, for the Boyeros team, which annually participates in the Provincial Championships of Havana.

Currently he combines those duties with the responsibility of vice president of the municipal commission for retired or active athletes of the Boyeros municipality, and provided valuable collaboration for several years in the offensive preparation of the Industriales and Metropolitanos selections, which participate in the National Baseball Series.

For his unforgettable exploits in every tournament in which he participated, Armando Capiró Lafferté is considered by many the greatest left fielder in the history of Cuban baseball, and one of the ten most outstanding players in the country after 1959. Rightfully he is part of the hundred most distinguished athletes of the twentieth century in Cuba.