When I was 7 years old I moved to Puerto Rico for a two year stint in Mayaguez, a beautiful city on the western half of la Isla. My fondest memories of my extended stay always take me back to a small and undragged, chain-link enclosed dirt field in my communidad where Little League games were played and celebrated. Celebrated is rarely a word you hear people say when they talk youth baseball, but Puerto Ricans with no familiar connection to players would come out in full force to cheer and jeer, eat and drink, bet on outcomes and individuals, and appreciate the finest form of sport in the world. After relocating to the Cleveland area, my prediction that this fan fare would be absent in the states was confirmed (or so I thought) and I settled for the plain old love of the game itself until the end of my college career.

As it turns out, I had to come out of retirement to find out that I can still have my pelota and play it too. A little networking and a lot of flare in my Lincoln Park league debut landed me an invite to play for Los Leones de la Liga Latina. On the Spanglish heavy Southwest side of town, the Latino version of beisbol is alive and kicking every Saturday and Sunday albeit with slightly more English thrown around – though not much. The players on my squad hail from some local and national colleagiate programs, but mostly Mexico, la Republica Dominicana, Cuba, Venezuela, y obviamente mi querido Puerto Rico. It’s energizing beyond belief to be peloteando again in this type of environment. It’s the type of thing you have to see and experience for yourself so if you’ve got a free weekend and you’re in the D, it’s worth swinging by Mexicantown to witness el Caribe’s greatest pastime.