Home SPORTS Mike Brito, Influential Dodger Scout in Mexico, Dies at 87

Mike Brito, Influential Dodger Scout in Mexico, Dies at 87

Brito’s different signings embrace the present Dodgers starter Julio Urias, who received 20 video games in 2021; the mercurial outfielder Yasiel Puig, who’s Cuban; pitchers Ismael Valdez, Joakim Soria, Antonio Osuna, Victor Gonzalez and Dennys Reyes; shortstop Juan Castro; and the outfielder Karim Garcia. One other of his finds, Bobby Castillo, a transformed third baseman often called Babo, taught Valenzuela methods to throw a screwball.

“I’m not mendacity to you,” Brito advised The Los Angeles Instances in 2011. “Inside per week, Fernando was throwing the screwball pretty much as good as Babo.”

“For a lot of, many prospects from Mexico, he was a God,” Jaime Jarrín, a Dodgers’ Spanish-language broadcaster since 1959, advised Baseball America final yr. “They beloved him as a result of he protected them.”

Mike Brito was born on Aug. 21, 1934, in Cuba. As a catcher, beginning in 1955, he performed three seasons within the decrease tiers of the Washington Senators’ minor league system, then a number of seasons within the Mexican League.

After retiring, he moved to Los Angeles, the place he discovered work as a truck driver and arrange an grownup beginner league that he additionally performed in.

Scouting grew to become his method to keep in baseball. “Due to God, I grew to become a scout within the Mexican League,” he stated in a brief video profile, “The White Hat & Wild Horse: The Scout Who Discovered Puig.” When he was requested by Dodgers Common Supervisor Al Campanis to work for the crew, he recalled pondering, “It’s such as you discover a man within the desert and ask him if he desires a glass of water.

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