Rigoberto Fuentes Peat

Rigoberto "Tito" Fuentes Peat retired baseball player, second baseman who played in 13 seasons in the Major Leagues between 1965 and 1978. Fuentes played most of this time for the San Francisco Giants where he remains one of the fans' favorites.

The Giants signed Fuentes at 18 years old as an amateur before starting in the 1962 season. He was one of the last players to sign directly from Cuba before the embargo against Cuba was established.

He made his major league debut in 1965 in a late season call-up. Fuentes divided his time between second base and shortstop in 1966. He batted .261 in his first year while putting in solid defense at both positions. The following year he batted .209 and then spent all of 1968 in the minor leagues.

Fuentes returned to the Giants in 1969 and spent the next two seasons as a utility infielder before regaining his starting position at second base in 1971. He appeared in the postseason during 1971 as his Giants won the NL West title; his two home runs in the first game of the 1971 NLCS helped San Francisco take an early lead against the Pittsburgh Pirates, but this was the only game won in the best-of-five series by the Giants.

Fuentes continued for three more seasons at second base for the Giants. In 1973, he set a National League record with a .993 fielding percentage, the highest of any regular second baseman in league history. Ironically, Fuentes had led all National League second basemen in errors during the two seasons before establishing the new record. His record stood for 13 seasons until Ryne Sandberg posted a .994 in 1986.

After the 1974 season, San Francisco traded Fuentes and he went to the San Diego Padres. Tito played two seasons in San Diego before becoming a free agent.

In 1977, Fuentes played with the Detroit Tigers and had a batting average of .309. Although this was his best season, he did not return in 1978 (since the Tigers had young Lou Whitaker). The Montreal Expos then purchased his contract. But, before the start of the season Fuentes was released. That year, he signed with the Oakland Athletics, but was released again after batting .140 in just 13 games. Shortly after he retired.

Fuentes returned to the Giants as a radio announcer in 1981, this was the first year that Spanish language radio broadcasts were conducted, and he performed this role until 1992. In 2004, Fuentes began working as an analyst, and today he continues to do this work.

Tito Fuentes was inducted into the Hispanic Heritage Baseball Museum Hall of Fame on February 22, 2002 in San Francisco, California.