2012 All Star Game Tribute: El Paso
The El Paso Iron Horse will be hosting the 2012 All-Star game
The El Paso Iron Horses have had a tough time in EWB over the years and have had some memorable times in EWB. In 41 years of playing baseball they have made the playoffs 9 times and won the World Series twice ('86,'93) So that puts a percentage of making the playoffs at about 22 %, so over the last 41 years the Iron Horses have only made the playoffs 22 percent of the time. That is not a great percentage for success over a 41 year history, but it is better than a lot of other teams in EWB, and to have won 2 World Series is still pretty good for a team that has Houston, and Dallas money and San Francisco/Austin in your division it has been a tough hill to climb. San Antonio has their past although they did have a nice stretch there in the late 90's and 2000's. We liken the Iron Horses as like TCU of Texas, Dallas/Texas, Houston,A&M, SF/Austin/ Texas Tech. Ironically as I say that, they, SF/Austin and Dallas all have 2 World Series while Houston and San Antonio have 1.
The Texas Division has always been about politics and the "My dick is bigger than your dick" mentality and the bigger dicks were and are Dallas, Houston, and at the time Austin. Now with Austin moving to San Francisco, San Francisco has basically been shunned by the Texas Divsion elite, basically treated like the Nebraska Cornhuskers were treated in the Big 12. El Paso is higher on the pecking order than San Antonio, but everyone is although the people in the division would rather San Antonio win than those "faggots out west."
El Paso was the 4th team entered in EWB in the Texas Divsion, the last being San Antonio as we all know the history and idea of having a team in every country in North America, but El Paso may have had the hardest time as they had a weak ownership group and a somewhat small population/media market to handle a EWB team. Houston as we know had the Bush family and it's ties and money, Dallas had billionaire Ross Perot and his oil money, Austin had it's oil money and El Paso had to come up with money and a strong ownership to be able to assure the other owners that they would be fiscally sound and not fail them.
Since there was no EWB team to be in Arizona or New Mexico, EWB wanted to gain the viewership/market of those states because the league had to have a team that the southwest part of the country rooted for and identified with and since there was no team in west Texas the only city that made sense was El Paso. The owners of the other Texas teams cringed at the idea because they view west Texas as the shithole of Texas and basically Mexico. Ross Perot was heard saying at the time that he didn't want those "border jumpers" to have a team and that they devalue the organization and therefore not make him money. Austin's owner also had the same type of comments, but basically he was more brash about it when he was heard saying that those people will come over the border and stay and will have no money to go to games and scare the white people away. The worst statement may have come from George HW Bush when he said "Great now we will have n*****s on the east of us and now spics on the west." So the climate in the newly forming division wasn't the greatest and the Texas owners compared this situation when that "fucker" Kennedy pushed blacks on us and now the commissioner is pushing mexicans on us. They had no other option and with the pressure of EWB they had to allow El Paso at least a path to ownership.
El Paso's initial ownership group was a couple of business men from the west Texas area, they thought they had all the finances in order and thought that they were good to go and so they were ready to present their case to EWB and before the meeting one of the potential owners bailed on the deal because of shady finances and therefore the other business owner had no one else to buy the club.
El Paso was looking weaker and weaker, hence the skepticism from the other Texas owners, but EWB, wanting a team in the Southwest, found an owner group for the city since the city at the time was unable to find financing. The new owners were the company Old El Paso, yes that's right Old El Paso the company that makes Mexican food. EWB thought it was a great fit, a company that makes Mexican food for a team in the Southwest that borders Mexico and has a high Mexican population. The marketing people at EWB thought this would be a home run financially for the El Paso franchise, city, and EWB. The advertising, the culture, everything about this deal screamed success and they also found it ironic that the company name had El Paso in it even though they were not located in El Paso.
The city of El Paso, mayor, city council, etc, didn't care who owned it all they cared about was that there was going to be an EWB team in it's city and since there is very good tax opportunities in the state of Texas the Old El Paso company thought it was a great advertising opportunity and they thought how hard could it possibly be to own a baseball team, it couldn't be that hard.
So the next step would be where we play, what a team name would be and who we could get to fill out our front office and baseball people. Well the first answer is a team name. They originally wanted to name the team the Salsa, because they thought that would be a perfect name for their taco sauce, the El Paso Salsa, they thought it had a ring to it and it was advertising, but EWB said no because they should represent the Southwestern part of the country, so the Old El Paso company looked into it and they thought the railroad was important to that part of the country and decided that it should be called the Iron Horses. They had one of their marketing comapnies design the logo and it came out pretty cool. They decided on grey, red and black pinstripes because it was unique and that no other team had that color combo and that the red letters on the jersey would remind people of their taco sauce. One company exec. stated "It looks like somebody dropped fucking taco sauce on their jersey and it spells out El Paso, I LOVE IT."
Where to play, well they had to play at an Independent League stadium for the first couple of seasons, while their new stadium was being built, it wasn't the best in EWB or had the most seats or alot of ammenities, actually years later the Uni-vision crew that did alot of the Iron Horses games called Iron Horse stadium "Cagar" which is spanish for taking a shit. The Old El Paso company named the stadium originally Old El Paso Stadium, and later on that was changed in 1986 when T Boone Pickens bought the team, but at the origianl time in 1972 the stadium was named Old El Paso Stadium for 14 years.
Who would be the front man, well since the company had no resources in baseball it turned to a guy named Sully Don Vincent, Sully was a baseball guy who had really no success in baseball but he was a retread guy that held multiple jobs in baseball so he was hired to name everybody in the front office and all the baseball men. Sully Don had ALOT of grudges and enemies in the game so his list wasn't the best so he named all his buddies to all the positions and he named himself the GM for the Innagural season.
Sully Don named Juan Montoya the franchises first manager, Juan was a happy go lucky guy and he joked with the players and the players liked Montoya but their play suffered in the first year as the team went 78-84 finishing 5th out of 5 teams. Sully Don was fired by the company after Ted Williams left the Omaha Wolverines after one season and the Old El Paso people hired Ted to become GM because of his greatness. Ted didn't like jokesters and was fucking pissed that Juan was a jokester and that was not the way Ted played, Ted was serious and he thought his team needed to be and he told him after the season that since he was a jokester that he had a joke for him, " You are fired, now get your fucking clown act out of here" Ted had high expectations and nobody thought anybody could meet them, and apparently he didn't either so he named himself Manager.
Ted managed from '71 - '74 and the teams success, shitty, Ted went 251-397, he only won about 39% of his games. 3 of 4 of those seasons he lost over 100 games in a season. Not only did the team fail on the field he was the manager/GM, and lets just say his GM duties suffered also so he fled to Pittsburgh to take them over.
The Old El Paso people were left standing their with egg on their face as Ted left the team shitty and bolted to Pittsburgh so they had a corporate guy run the organization. They figured if a guy with the knowledge and experience of a person in the game couldn't do it than fuck it let some one that is good with numbers do it. The new corp. guy hired Garry Myers to manage the team. Myers had a a good run as the manager of El Paso he went 645-614 a 51% winning percentage and 3 playoff appearances. He did quit after 123 games into the '83 season to where he was quoted as saying "This is the biggest bunch of fucking dumb fucks that run this team, I cannot do it anymore." I would rather coach a minor league team than put up with these fucking assholes, I mean they run this organization like shit, they think that having taco tuesday nights at the ball field is more important than the game, and to top it off we had to wear soft taco shells as hats some nights, what is this a fucking taco picnic or a baseball team, fuck them" Well Garry Myers did leave and did coach Kissimmee mL team for the last 12 games of the '83 season and no one has heard from him since. Now that's not amazing numbers for Myers, but for what the guy had to take over and the shitty leadership by a food company that's pretty good. Amazingly the San Antonio Aztecas let the Old El Paso company hire away their AA manager, Carlos Alvarez, to finish off the season. Alvarez went 27-12 in the last 39 games. he never got the chance to be the manager for next season because he was let go at seasons end and given a package of Old El Paso mild taco seasoning, and a box of hard shell tacos for his work.
The team hired John McNamara for the '84-'85 season. McNamara went 182-142 for a 56% winning percentage. He made the playoffs in his first season and won the division with a 93-69 record. People were wondering what if Myers stayed around, he had built a good team that was getting better and took them to 3 playoffs, but people kind of got turned off by McNamara because of his attitude. In '85 the team went backwards and finished 3rd and people were wondering if this team would ever get over the hump.
The big news came in the fall of '85 when the Old El Paso company decided to get out of the baseball business and sell the team. Out of the 16 years Old El Paso owned the franchise they were running in the red 6 of the 16 and one of those years, 1976, they were 17 million in the red, and for 1976 that was an astronomical number. At the end of the day they were not making any money and decided to sell to, you guessed it, another oil man from Texas, T. Boone Pickens.
T. Boone came in and fired McNamara and hired Steve Tracy to be his new manager. Tracy was from Texas and Pickens thought they needed a "Texas Attitude" to get them over the hump, and boy did it ever. In 1986, Pickens and Tracy's first year, they won the World Series beating Chicago. El Paso finished with a 93-69 record and a Texas Division title also. El Paso younger players finally were hitting their groove like hitters, RF Don Kelly .333/34/88, CF Juan Freitas .334/10/80, 1B Jesus Lopez .263/32/125, 3B Francisco Neri .267/21/65, C Adam Taylor .263/21/84, and Pitchers Michael Bowden 18-9/2.70/236K, Robbie Barfield 15-10/3.11/187K, Mark Kirby 16-9/3.13/252K, and closer Ron Taylor 41 saves. They had a good core of players that finally hit their prime.
In 1987 Tracy went 82-80 and finished 2nd in the division and missed out on the playoffs. Tracy bolted after that season because Detroit's manager's position became available and Detroit threw an ungodly number at him and he left for Detroit. Pickens didn't care because he thought they won because of his leadership ability and not Tracy's managerial decisions. Ultimately get two Texas guys in a room and win and you got 2 big heads and the owner always wins.
In 1988 Pickens hired longtime mL manager Roger Craig. Craig had pretty good success in the mL and Pickens thought Craig would listen to him, but he still had the pedigree to be manager to look go to the public. Craig went on to manage until 1991. Craig went to the playoffs twice in four years and won one division title and finishing 2nd and 3rd twice. Well Pickens blamed it on Craig for his stagnant teams and no championships so he fired Craig after the '91 season. Craig finished with a 344-304 record for a 53% winning percentage.
In 1992 Pickens hired Dale Jackson as manager, a black man from Omaha, Nebraska to manage the 1992 season. The team finished 3rd in the division with a 80-82 record. Needless to say Pickens hired a black man in Texas to run his team, once he failed he heard it too much from the fans and fellow Texas owners and he let him go after one season. He officially said that he wouldn't stand for a losing record and we need a guy that understand's our culture.
In 1993 he hired Eduardo Mendoza away from AAA Dallas affiliate Las Vegas. Pickens was finding it tough to find a good manager with a revolving door in El Paso so he ran out of options and at the last minute friend and fellow Texas Division owner Ross Perot let him hire his AAA manager. Well that didn't last long, Mendoza's tenure in El Paso may have been the shortest in EWB history, for a manager hired at the begining of the season, it lasted all of 34 games, as Mendoza was let go after a 13-21 start. The media started to think Pickens was crazy and that NO good manager would ever want to work under Pickens.
Pickens was out of options and in the beginning of the season it was nearly impossible to hire anyone so he turned to his only option. He hire Marcos Cabral, LA Gargoyles A manager of the Lancaster Investigators. I cannot tell you what a laughing stock Pickens turned into, he paid the LA Gargoyles 5 million dollars to let him hire away their A manager in the middle of a season mind you. This was the biggest joke in sports, Cabral had won a couple of championships in the minors but other than that alot of 5th place finishes over the many years in the minors. El Paso would need a mracle for this to work.......Guess what, it did work, Cabral finished the season with a 76-51 record and 2nd in the division and barely getting into the playoffs. This team could not lose, they were taking the "Us vs the World" mentality and it worked. The Iron Horses won the whole fucking thing. They beat the Admirals in the World Series, the Admirals were in the Series the year before and ALL the money was on the Admirals. This was one of the greatest upsets in sports history. Not just the Series, but the whole scenario. This team was a team of destiny. The Iron Horses had two of the best hitters in the game batting 3-4 in RF Don Kelly .325/32/108, and 2nd year FA LF Keith Whitfield .369/28/95. Whitfield signed with the Iron Horses in January on '92 for 6/43.35 million dollars from 7 years in Portland. Kelly and Whitfield were called the "Gruesome Twosome" by scribes in El Paso. These two, later HOF's, were 2 of the best players in the game and the Iron Horses "rode" them to a championship. Mark Kirby was the only SP left from the last World Series championship in '86. Kirby ended the '93 season w/ a 13-5/4.22/96 K. That was truly a remarkable season. Oh and by the way, you may be wondering what ever happened to Wally Pip, I mean Eduardo Mendoza, well he didn't find another job until 1999, where he got a job with the Minneapolis Mutiny and managed them until 2003, He did in those 5 years finish 1st 3 years, 2nd once and 5th in his final season where he was let go and got a job managing the Cleveland Rockers in 2004, where he only managed 45 games that year and went 27-18, and No Cleveland didn't go on to win the World Series.
After that it was pretty down hill, 1994 the defending champs went 81-81 and finished 3rd in the division, Cabral just didn't have the magic anymore and Pickens fired him after the '94 season. Which was very controversial and people basically said we have Al Davis as an owner.
In 1995 Pickens hired Glen Gardner as manager. Gardner was a longtime minor league manager who had little to no success. He was another black man, but from Mesquite, Texas. It was getting extremely hard for Pickens to find managers with any quality, so he was relegated to lifelong mL managers. Well once again the Iron Horses were pissing away talent they had and they finished 76-86 and 4th in the division. Well guess what happened, you guessed it he fired Gardner after one season.
In 1996 Pickens hires Martin Bender, a promising mL manager who had finished first in his first 2 years of 3 years of managing the Frederick Sea Eagles the single A team of the then Carolina Colonials. Well the 1996 season ended up like the others before, the team finished 76-86 and dead last in the division. He was let go at seasons end and went to D.C.
In 1997 Pickens hires Javier Collazo, another shitty mL manager with all shitty finishes in his resume. Collazo actually got to manage 3 YEARS, but they were 3 shitty seasons, where they finished 4th,3rd,3rd and ended up being fired after the '99 season. Collazo finished with a 229-257 record.
In 2000 Pickens hires Joseph Reed, who actually comes from EWB managerial ranks. He had stints as manager in Houston and Denver which were not great at all before being hired in El Paso. Reed also got to manage for 3.5 YEARS. and you guessed it again, failure. Reed finished 4th.3rd.3rd,5th and he only finished 87 games of the '03 before he was fired. Ed O'Sullivan was hired for the last 71 games and finished with a horrible 23-48 record. In his 3.5 years, Reed finished with a record of 219-277.
In the early 2000's T. Boone died, probably of a broken heart and lack of any knowledge of how to hire a good manager. Bob Pickens takes over the team and it stays in the family. Hopefully Bob is smarter the T. Boone.
Bob Pickens hires his first manager in 2004 and keeps hold over Ed O'Sullivan. People are shcoked because Bob kept someone who finished the season. Ed actually managed until 2010 where he had some success finishing 2nd 3 years and winning the division and making the playoffs in 2010. 2010 was the first time the Iron Horses made the playoffs since they won the World Series in 1993. Bob Pickens is actually showing signs of patience, something Iron Horse fans have really never seen before, they have had success as of late and with Tweety Bird Lopez and Mango Phillips and other promising starters they have something to build on. Ed O'Sullivan laid some good ground work for the new Iron Horse manager Devin Dean and the draft is finally paying off after YEARS and YEARS of nothing to show for drafts. Remember Don Kelly was NOT DRAFTED period. He signed a one year contract w/ Denver in 1984 and got claimed off waivers by El Paso 2 months later. The only notable draft picks for El Paso over the years is...Vince Dorsey, 10th overall pick in 1999. 2003 SP Butch Johnson, and a little known fact about Tweety Bird Lopez is that Tweety Bird was drafted 2nd overall in 2003 by OMAHA and failed to sign, re enters draft in 2004 and was taken number one overall by El Paso.
So in summation, like I stated in the beginning El Paso Iron Horses have had a tough time in EWB over the years and have had some memorable times in EWB is a pretty accurate statement after going throug their history. T. Boone Pickens and Al Davis are almost identical in their philosophies except Al Davis is still alive in 2011.