The Tigres del Licey expect to add Major League Baseball talents Ronny Mauricio and Miguel Andujar in the first week of November, general manager Audo Vicente said this week.
Mauricio is not expected to have his play restricted by the New York Mets organization, Vicente said. Under the Winter League Agreement, teams cannot veto players from playing winter ball in their home country, but they can put limits on their participation.
In 2022, Mauricio was the LIDOM MVP with Licey, leading the league with 15 doubles, 31 RBIs, 54 hits and a .468 slugging percentage as the Tigres. The following year, after making his MLB debut with the Mets and appearing in 26 big league games, Mauricio returned to Licey and appeared in eight games before suffering a knee injury that caused him to miss the 2024 MLB season and the 2024-25 LIDOM season. He appeared in 12 games with Licey last winter, slashing .212/.276/.365 with two homers and 12 RBIs.
Andujar hasn't appeared in LIDOM since 2024-25, when he played in eight games for the Tigres. A year earlier, Andujar slashed .306/.344/.405 in 19 games with 19 RBIs.
In 541 MLB games over 10 seasons, Andujar has a .306/.344/.405 batting line with 58 homers and 245 RBIs. He's appeared in 96 LIDOM games over six seasons with the Gigantes del Cibao, Estrellas Orientales, and Licey, batting .247/.290/.332 with six homers and 42 RBIs.
An All-Time Tigre - After entering Sunday's game against the Leones del Escogido in the bottom of the 10th inning as a pinch runner for ghost runner Sergio Alcantara, Emilio Bonifacio stole third and then scored when Leones catcher Randy Florentino couldn't come up with Kelly Austin's cutter, which missed outside and skittered to the backstop, allowing Bonifacio to score, giving the Tigres del Licey a 5-4 win in the first skirmish of this season's Battle of Santo Domingo.
In addition to the win, the run was the 317th Bonifacio has scored in his career with the Tigres, giving him the all-time mark as he passed Cesarin Geronimo. Now in his 18th LIDOM season, all with the Tigres, Bonifacio is the Tigres stolen base leader with 124. He's also three hits away from joining Manny Mota, Teodoro Martínez, Cesarín Gerónimo, Pedro González, Rafael Landestoy, Elvio Jiménez, and Anderson Hernández as Tigres players with 500 career hits and three triples away from tying Manny Mota for the all-time mark of 37.
Another Big Moment For the Kid - After homering in his first at-bat for the Tigres del Licey, the top MLB prospect according to MLB Pipeline, Jesus Made, tied Sunday night's game against Escogido with an RBI single in the bottom of the ninth, sending half of the crowd at Estadio Quisqueya Juan Marichal into a frenzy. Made had 14 homers and 91 RBIs in 122 games with a .774 OPS for Double-A Biloxi in the Milwaukee Brewers chain this summer.
Made, along with Maxwell Romero Jr. and Yamal Encarnación, are the Tigres' rookie class for this season.
“I’m really happy to see these new talents who, as we promised at training camp, the public was going to start getting to know. Not just a player like Madé, who had an impressive debut. We’ve really seen a lot of things in the game, but you never stop being surprised,” Vicente said on the Licey website.
Big Star Power - Just three games into his second season in LIDOM, Estrellas Orientales first baseman Josh Lester leads the league with five RBIs, having blasted a three-run homer and an RBI double in the Estrellas' 11-0 opening night blowout of the Toros del Este in La Romana and an RBI single in the Green Machine's 8-3 win in their home opener against the Leones del Escogido.
Tonight's LIDOM Schedule
All times Eastern Daylight Time
7 p.m. - Tigres del Licey (2-1/SP - Daniel Martinez) at Gigantes del Cibao (2-1/SP - Jackson Goddard)
7:15 p.m. - Estrellas Orientales (2-1) at Leones del Escogido (0-3)
7:30 p.m. - Aguilas Cibaenas (1-2) at Toros del Este (2-1/SP - Noah Skirrow)