# Grandson of former Cuban colonel Tortoló plays with Argentina in Sub-23 Baseball Pre-World Cup

**Date:** 06/16/2022

As of today, the Cuban baseball team is one of three teams qualified for the semifinal phase of the Pan American Championship (Pre-World Cup) Sub-23, held in the Mexican city of Aguascalientes and for the world cup next October in Taiwan.

One of the members of the Argentine squad that faced the Cubans in their debut and has participated in all three games of his team is Noe Pedro Tortoló Santa María, a player born in Buenos Aires on January 24, 2003, but with a close and strong family tie to Cuba, where he lived for several years.

Before commenting on his relationship with our country, I will offer you his statistics in the Mexican tournament, which allowed him to debut with a national team of his native country. In three games (two as designated hitter and one as left fielder) he accumulates six at-bats, with one hit, one run scored, one RBI, two walks, three strikeouts and was caught stealing once. Against Caribbean pitching, he negotiated a transfer and struck out once.

According to an article published last week by Argentine colleague Diego Beccacece, Noe Pedro joined the South American squad to participate in this tournament in Houston, United States, as he has resided there for a few years and is enrolled at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida.

The 19-year-old player, whose mother is Argentine, is the son of Cuban baseball coach Noel Tortoló, descendant of Pedro Tortoló, who was a colonel in the Revolutionary Armed Forces and the main Cuban military chief in Grenada when the United States invasion and other Caribbean nations occurred in that country in October 1983.

According to the Argentine Baseball media outlet, the youngest was born in the Palermo neighborhood and according to his own words, he remained in that country until he was five years old. Later his father brought him to Havana.

"I played there—in Cuba—with the U15 national preselection, but I didn't make the national team because I'm not 100% Cuban. I have relatives in Buenos Aires on my mother's side, like my uncle and my grandmother.

"Of the outfielders I like Mike Trout, obviously, and the determination with which Yasiel Puig plays. I also watch a lot of Fernando Tatis's movements at shortstop, his flow is admirable, and Javy Báez. From him I take the passion he puts into the sport," he told that publication at the end of 2019.

In July 2016 he participated in the sixth edition of the Punta Cana International Tournament in the Dominican Republic, as part of a group composed of children from Havana and unaffiliated with the Cuban Baseball Federation. The team manager was his father and that is where the brothers Roberto and Raúl Campos left the small delegation.

A year earlier, Noe Pedro, also managed by his father, attended the Disney International Salute to Baseball tournament in Orlando, Florida, where the Habaneros U12 team won the bronze medal.