José Oquendo, Puerto Rican-American baseball player and coach
José Manuel Roberto Guillermo Oquendo Contreras (born July 4, 1963), nicknamed The Secret Weapon, is a Puerto Rican former infielder and current coach in Major League Baseball (MLB). He currently serves as Minor League Infield Coordinator of the St. Louis Cardinals, an organization with whom he has been affiliated since 1985. He managed the Puerto Rico national team in the 2006 and 2009 World Baseball Classics. During his playing career, Oquendo proved highly versatile defensively: he played primarily second base and shortstop, but also frequently in the outfield, and made at least one appearance at every position during his MLB playing career. Oquendo has the second-highest career fielding percentage for second basemen at .9919 (99.19%), behind only Plácido Polanco's career mark of .9927 (99.27%).From Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico, the New York Mets signed Oquendo as an amateur free agent in 1979 at age 15. He made his MLB debut with the Mets in 1983 and was traded to the Cardinals in 1985. In 1988, he made his catching debut, giving him an appearance at every position. From 1989 to 1991, he was the Cardinals' regular second baseman alongside shortstop Ozzie Smith. Oquendo's best season offensively came in 1989, when he batted .291, 28 doubles, .747 on-base plus slugging percentage (OPS) and a major-league leading 163 games played. In 1990, he produced his best season defensively, recording the fewest errors (three) for a second baseman in a season with at least 150 games played.
Following his playing career, Oquendo coached and managed in the Cardinals' Minor League Baseball system in 1997 and 1998, and became their bench coach at the major league level the following year. In 2000, he became the Cardinals' third base coach, remaining in that role until 2015, while helping lead the club to 11 playoff appearances, including World Series championships in 2006 and 2011 and four National League pennants. He missed the 2016 season after sustaining a knee injury that required surgery and rehabilitation; at the time, he was the longest-tenured coach in MLB. In 2017, he began serving as a special assistant to Cardinals general manager Mike Girsch, instructing at the Cardinals training facility in Jupiter, Florida. For the 2018 season, he returned to the Cardinals major league team to serve as third base coach. In 2019, he became the Cardinals' Minor League Infield Coordinator.
1963Jul, 4
José Oquendo
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Events on 1963
- 8Jan
Mona Lisa
Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa is exhibited in the United States for the first time, at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. - 8Feb
John F. Kennedy
Travel, financial and commercial transactions by United States citizens to Cuba are made illegal by the John F. Kennedy administration. - 21Apr
Bahá'í Faith
The first election of the Universal House of Justice is held, marking its establishment as the supreme governing institution of the Bahá'í Faith. - 7Oct
Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty
John F. Kennedy signs the ratification of the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. - 22Nov
Assassination of John F. Kennedy
U.S. President John F. Kennedy is assassinated and Texas Governor John Connally is seriously wounded by Lee Harvey Oswald