While the Bravos de Leon don’t start their season in the Liga Mexicana de Beisbol until Friday evening, the team president is playing hardball with the local government.
Speaking after the club took a team photo at the landmark Arco de la Calzada in Leon, club president Mauricio Martinez didn’t mince words about the club’s need to replace the 53-year-old Estadio Domingo Santana.
“Other parts of the United States are looking for me, because the idea of the league is to expand into the United States… they’re offering us the chance to go play there,” Martínez said in a story published by Mexican newspaper Milenio. “I am waiting for an appointment with the governor, an appointment with Alejandra Gutiérrez (the mayor of León), because it is an issue that we have to evaluate.”
⚾ “Es necesario construir un nuevo estadio. Estoy buscando colaboración entre el municipio, el estado y empresarios para lograrlo”: Mauricio Martínez, propietario de Bravos de León.
?: Omar Díaz
? https://t.co/9WnA3aR0qL pic.twitter.com/j3VeJVx6Ok
— La Afición (@laaficion) April 15, 2026
Opened in 1973, the ballpark in Leon has hosted 21 seasons of LMB baseball during two eras, the first starting in 1979 and running until 1991 and more recently when the Broncos de Reynosa relocated to Leon for the 2017 season, where they rebranded as the Bravos and have played ever since. Leon’s lone Serie del Rey title came in 1990, when the Bravos beat the Algodoneros de Union Laguna four games to one.
Asked if the league had plans to place teams in the U.S., an LMB spokesperson declined comment.
Notably, Martinez did not specify which cities in the U.S. have been interested in bringing in an LMB franchise.
Currently, the Tecolotes de los Dos Laredos split their home games between Laredo, Texas, and Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mexico. Prior to relocating to Leon, the Bravos franchise played in Reynosa, Tamaulipas, a city of around 700,000 on the other side of the U.S. border from McAllen, Texas.
McAllen previously had a professional team in the United Baseball League from 2001-13 that played at Edinburg Stadium, a 5,000-seat ballpark that is the home of the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley Roadrunners.
Last winter, the Mayos de Navojoa of the Liga ARCO Mexicana del Pacifico, the country’s winter league, attempted to move to Tucson, Arizona’s Kino Veterans Memorial Stadium, which once hosted Arizona Diamondbacks and Chicago White Sox spring training, as well as the Triple-A affiliates of the Diamondbacks and San Diego Padres, but hasn’t had a high-level professional baseball team as a tenant since 2013. The move failed when they team was unable to secure visas for players and staff to work in the U.S., and the team announced this week that they’d be returning to Navojoa, Sonora, Mexico for the 2026-27 season.
“This is my city, I love my city, but we can’t stay here all the time with what’s happening: the league is growing, the teams are growing, and the Bravos can’t be left behind in terms of infrastructure, players, or anything else,” Martinez said. “We have to keep up with what’s happening.”
Photo: The 2026 Bravos de Leon posed in front of the Arco de la Calzada in Leon on Wednesday. Team president Mauricio Martinez says the team needs a new stadium to remain viable in Leon. (Photo courtesy of the Bravos de Leon)
