Candy Maldonado
Template:Infobox MLB retired Candido Maldonado Guadarrama (born September 5, 1960 in Humacao, Puerto Rico) was a Major League Baseball outfielder from 1981 to 1995 for the Los Angeles Dodgers 1981-1985, San Francisco Giants 1986-1989, Cleveland Indians, Milwaukee Brewers, Toronto Blue Jays (twice), Chicago Cubs, and Texas Rangers. Maldonado was noted as a good home run hitter who did not usually hit for a high batting average which was, as of 1989 a .251. Interestingly, he played in eight different postseason series for three of his teams and won the World Series with the Blue Jays in 1992. He most recently could be found providing color commentary for ESPN Deportes' coverage of the World Baseball Classic.
San Francisco
"The Candyman""The 4th Out" was a major part of the Giants success in the late 1980s as a part of the 1987 NL West Champions and the 1989 National League Champions.
One memorable highlight from the Candy Maldonado era with the San Francisco Giants came during an altercation with the St. Louis Cardinals. Will Clark slid hard into second base where Ozzie Smith was not pleased and took a swipe at Clark. Soon thereafter, Clark was defenseless as Jose Oquendo joined the fracas beating on Will. Next thing you knew, Candy (missing only a cape) came flying from first base to throw a punch that knocked Smith into the outfield. Giants Manager Roger Craig was quoted as saying it was the fastest he had seen Candy go from first to second.
Although Maldonado had statistically good seasons in San Francisco, he was involved in one of the most infamous Giants plays ever. In game 6 of the 1987 National League Championship Series, he lost Tony Peña's 2nd inning fly ball in the lights. This play resulted in a triple for Peña. Peña scored on a sacrifice fly for the only run of the game, which the Cardinals won to tie the series at 3 games each, before going on to win Game 7.
Career highlights
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Maldonado's career batting average was 51 points higher on the road than at home.
Maldonado became only the 16th player in San Francisco Giants franchise history to hit for the cycle on May 4, 1987.
Candy scored the first Indians run at Jacobs Field.
See also
External links
- Articles needing cleanup from July 2008
- Articles with sections that need to be turned into prose from July 2008
- Living people
- Los Angeles Dodgers players
- San Francisco Giants players
- Cleveland Indians players
- Milwaukee Brewers players
- Toronto Blue Jays players
- Chicago Cubs players
- Texas Rangers players
- Major League Baseball announcers
- 1960 births
- Puerto Rican baseball players
- Baseball players who have hit for the cycle