Osvaldo José Virgil Pichardo Sr., the first player born in the Dominican Republic to appear in Major League Baseball when he joined his neighborhood team, the New York Giants, in 1956, died Sunday at age 92.
Virgil appeared in nine MLB seasons with the New York/San Francisco Giants (1956-57, 1966, 1969), the Detroit Tigers (1958, 1960-61), the Kansas City A’s (1961), the Baltimore Orioles (1962), and the Pittsburgh Pirates (1965), appearing in 324 games, and batting .231/.263/.331 with 14 career homers and 73 RBIs.
Born in Monti Cristi, Dominican Republic on May 17, 1932, Virgil’s family moved to the Bronx, a borough of New York City, when he was 15 years old, where he graduated from Dewitt Clinton High School. After a two-year stint in the United States Marine Corps, Virgil signed with the Giants in 1953.
After making his way through the Giants minor league system, with stops in St. Cloud, Minn., Danville, Va., Dallas and Minneapolis, Virgil was called up to the Major Leagues in September 1956 and made his MLB debut on September 20 against the Philadelphia Phillies. He went 0-for-4 and started at third base.
“That September 23 will always be in my memory, because that day I was the protagonist of a great historical achievement, without precedent in Dominican sports,” Virgil said in his biography, titled “Yo, Virgil, Mi Historia.” The title translates to “I, Virgil, My Story.”
And while it was an inauspicious start, it was the first appearance by a Dominican-born player in MLB, and there would be many more to follow. At press time, 915 Dominican players have appeared in the Major Leagues since Virgil Sr.’s debut, and there are others, including his son, Ozzie Virgil Jr., who were born elsewhere but have Dominican heritage.
“He means a lot,” Yankees star Juan Soto, a native of Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican Republic, told MLB.com last year. “He was the first Dominican coming to the big leagues and opened the doors for a lot of Dominicans — and not only Dominicans, for all Latin players.”
In the mid-1950s, the Giants, playing in the shadow of the New York Yankees and Brooklyn Dodgers, looked for new sources of talent to remain competitive. In 1957, a year after Virgil became the first Dominican in MLB with the Giants and the club’s final season playing in New York, Andre Rodgers became the first Bahamian in the big leagues, also with the Giants, and the club had a lineup that included players born in Cuba (Sandy Ponsegra), Puerto Rico (Ruben Gomez, Valmy Thomas), Scotland (Bobby Thomson), and Venezuela (Ramon Monzant).
By the time Virgil returned to the Giants organization in 1966 as an itinerant infielder, there were two other Dominicans donning the black and orange, outfielder Jesus Alou and pitcher Juan Marichal.
Virgil served as a player/coach coach under Clyde King in 1968 with the Phoenix Giants, the Triple-A affiliate. When King became manager of the Giants the next year, he brought Virgil along to his staff as third base coach. Virgil coached and scouted for the Giants until 1975, when he joined the staff the Montreal Expos. He stayed in Montreal through 1982, then went with Dick Williams to San Diego, where he and Williams led the Padres to their first World Series appearance in 1984, and Seattle in 1986.
All the while, Virgil stayed busy in the offseason, playing and managing in the winter leagues. As a player, he won a LIDOM title with the Leones del Escogido in 1955-56, months before his MLB debut, and batted .312 for the Leones the next year. He also played for the Aguilas Cibaenas in 1967-68 and 1970-71.
As a skipper, Virgil won a LIDOM championship in his native country with the Aguilas Cibaenas in 1971-72, helmed the Caneros del Este and Leones del Escogido, and managed the Leones del Caracas of the Liga Venezolana de Beisbol Profesional the next season, winning the league championship again. He was succeeded as manager in Caracas by Felipe Alou, a fellow Dominican who made his his MLB debut with the Giants two years after Virgil.
As the first Dominican in MLB, Virgil leaves a significant legacy as a trailblazer, Five Dominicans – Juan Marichal, Pedro Martínez, Vladimir Guerrero Sr., Adrián Beltré and David Ortiz – have earned induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., and his son, Ozzie Virgil Jr., went on to have an 11-year MLB career himself, playing for the Phillies, Atlanta Braves, and Toronto Blue Jays from 1980-90 and making two All-Star appearances.
“LIDOM and its teams send a message of encouragement to the family, friends and associates of Don Osvaldo, who brought glory to the sport we all love until the day he passed away,” said Vitelio Mejía Ortiz, the president of LIDOM. “He was and will continue to be a prominent figure in the national sporting spectrum due to the significance of his influence 68 years ago.”
Photo: Ozzie Virgil Sr., the first Dominican-born player in the MLB, throws out a ceremonial first pitch before the game between the New York Mets and the Atlanta Braves on September 26, 2018 at Citi Field in the Flushing neighborhood of the Queens borough of New York City. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
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