The ballparks all offer off-street parking and most charge a small fee. The upper seats are unreserved; the lower palcos cost more. Luxury seating is generally reserved by sponsors, but Caguas has a sports bar with a fine, air-conditioned view of the game. On non-game days, there is no customer service at the ballpark.
Teams sell season tickets with varying degrees of seriousness. A season ticket is discounted from individual game prices, often includes free admission to certain away games at nearby parks and, of special importance in Latin America, recognition as a minor VIP.
Stadium lights are visible throughout the vicinity (in San Juan, from anywhere in Hato Rey) and guide you to the stadium. For more specific directions, return to the index page and click on a city on the map.
There are few errors and frequent defensive heroics; but also lack of hustle and inattentive defense. Pitching stamina and defense are spotty at the start of the season. The veterans and wannabees in the stands criticize everything from lack of fundamentals to overspecialization in relievers; some days they are so bitter you would think all the teams are playing below .500.
Turmoil is ever-present. As in some US minor leagues, the roster is in constant flux because of payment uncertainties, technical slumps, a constant hunt for better talent, and personal factors. To the good, any team you care to follow might surge into the lead late in the season; to the bad, the team that starts the season sometimes bears little resemblance to the team in the playoffs.
Retention of players is a constant concern. The radical dialects of English on the Eastern seaboard, and the speed at which Latins speak Spanish, often make things inscrutable even for language students. A news article featured Puerto Ricans who move to the US and return for various reasons, from prejudice to being scared by snowfall; Francisco Oliveras told me he remembers difficult flights and the smell of skunks. Likewise, dozens of US players and one manager (Ken Griffey, Sr.) leave Puerto Rico in mid-season. By written request to the league, they can be barred from Caribbean baseball for three years. This is truly a Briar Patch solution.
Low attendance is chronic; reported attendance is exaggerated, sometimes by an order of magnitude. It gets better in the playoffs. When games become a media spectacle, such as the Caribbean World Series or the Texas/Toronto opener of the 2001 season held at the Bithorn, the house is packed. Maybe the public simply sees that the regular season is nearly meaningless because four of six teams make the playoffs.
Sponsorship deals sometimes limit the choices for beer drinkers. In 1999 at most parks it was the bland Coors Light (even Coors regular was unavailable). In 2000 at Santurce, Miller Lite got the exclusive franchise, but some vendors still wore the Coors Light bibs. The beer is cold; grandstand vendors often carry plastic tubs with ice. The best beer is India, brewed in Mayagüez and only available at that park. Outside the park, try Presidente from the Dominican Republic.
Teams do not have accordion-folded schedules as in the US, but the league prepares a free booklet, available at all the parks, containing the composite schedule. However, the league spent years with no presence on the Web; in 2000, the best players of the last century were voted on by a committee organized not by the league but by the team from Ponce. The baseballs are prepared specially with the name of the league. Once, they also had the line, "LEAGUE PRESIDENT," but no signature.
Santurce has a telecast when playing at home or in Caguas. The games of Caguas have been broadcast regionally on cable TV. If you watched these broadcasts and learned the abbreviations, you could score the game from the graphics without knowing Spanish. In the past, games were carried on Fox Sports Net; there was once a weekly broadcast back to New York City.
The thin San Juan Star tabloid ($0.45) is the only English daily. But feature articles are rare, the standings table is always present but rarely updated with last night's results, and the schedule is prepared once every week or two and reappears with some results retyped.
The web site links to streaming audio of Crabbers broadcasts on SuperKadena, but there have been technical problems with this. In 2002, Alex worked Crabbers telecasts and relied on visitors to post scores in the Guest Book.
Alex warns that he might not maintain the site continuously in 2003. The original address www.santurcecrabbers.com no longer works.
BolaDura (HardBall)
HardBall is an interesting read; it contains thumbnail news and opinion
articles, half on sports and half not, some in English and some in Spanish
depending on the source. It is maintained daily by Reinaldo Baretti.
users.centennialpr.net/mrmilan/criollos2k1.htm Caguas
Criollos (inactive as of 2020)
This fun site by Eric Millan is partly a personal album but its complete
pages on the history and traditions of the Criollos help you see how
a lifetime Criollos fan views the team. Eric has moved to Florida.