Orlando Hernandez

The story of baseball pitcher Orlando “El Duque” Hernández might read like a movie script still waiting to be written, yet it could be considered quite a common story for Cuban ballplayers who grew up under the Communist regime of Fidel Castro. Orlando Hernández went from beloved Cuban baseball star to banishment from baseball to becoming a four-time World Series winner in major-league baseball.

Orlando Hernández Pedroso’s age has at times been in doubt, but according to his passport, his Havana divorce agreement, and his Cuban baseball card, Orlando was born on October 11, 1965.1 He was the younger of two children conceived by Maria Julia Pedroso and Arnaldo Hernández Montero, though Arnaldo went on to have additional children with other women, the most notable of whom was Liván Hernández, who had a 17-year career in the majors.

According to an interview with Arnaldo by reporters Steve Fainaru and Ray Sánchez, described in their book The Duke of Havana, Arnaldo had named his second son Arnoldo; however, in his youth, the boy rejected this name exclaiming, “Yo soy Orlando! (“I am Orlando!”) and thus his parents obliged and called him such.2

It was Orlando’s father, Arnaldo, while playing for the Pasta Gravy toothpaste company baseball team, who was first given the moniker of El Duque. In the interview with Fainaru and Sánchez, Arnaldo recounted the story of the nickname as follows: “I was a campesino and whenever anyone asked me for anything, I’d say ‘Take It.’” One day [my coach] Chico Fuentes said, ‘What a noble young man,’ and the first name he gave me was El Conde. But it didn’t sound right. So then he decided to call me ‘El Duque.’ I think it also came from (American baseball player) Duke Snider. And from then on my real name disappeared.”3

In addition to passing on the nickname to his son, Orlando’s father also passed along his baseball uniform number, 26. The number represented the date July 26, 1953, when Fidel Castro kicked off the Cuban revolution by launching his attack on the Moncada barracks in Santiago.

Orlando’s father and mother met through baseball. Arnaldo had been learning to pitch while playing for the Havana Psychiatric Hospital baseball team. He boarded the bus to go to a baseball game when he caught the attention of Maria Julia, who was working as a lab technician at the hospital.4

Though they fell in love, married, and had two boys, the marriage between Maria Julia Pedroso and Arnaldo Hernández Montero did not last more than a few years. Arnaldo was known to drink and play around. Orlando Hernández was just 2 years old when his father left.

In their youth growing up, Orlando and his older brother, Arnaldo Hernández Pedroso, who died at the age of 30 from an aneurysm caused by a cerebral hemorrhage, were extremely close with one another both emotionally and physically. The two boys slept in the same bed until they reached their teens when the bed finally collapsed under their collective growing bodies.5 Baseball had run in their family’s blood, not just with their father but with their uncle, nicknamed Minosito, who was an infielder and the person Orlando credited with teaching him the game.6 Orlando and his brother lived with their mother and her extended family in adjoining row homes next to a church in the town of Wajay.7

Growing up, the family did not have much wealth. Orlando recalled having one pair of pants that he called “the Weeklies” because he wore them every day except Saturdays, when he wore a second pair of pants he called “Big Saturdays” that he dressed in when going to a party.8

Orlando grew up in Rancho Boyeros, a district of Havana. As a youth he was coached by Rolando Nuñez, also known as Chavito (Little Chavez).9 Nuñez described Orlando’s baseball ability: “As a boy, he did not distinguish himself as a ballplayer. It was just his perseverance that won out in the end – his dedication. He was in love with the game, it’s as simple as that. He loved the game with everything he had. He trained more than any player I’ve ever seen. He ran for miles and miles and miles and miles. He simply worked harder than anybody else.”10

By age 16, El Duque had a prodigious curveball, an acceptable fastball, and an ability to concentrate that exceeded his peers leading to his acceptance into a high school for athletes known as the Higher Institute of Athletic Perfection (EPSA).11

Orlando was drafted into the army, not to fight but to play baseball. (Army divisions fielded their own teams.) While pitching for the Western Army (Ejercito Occidental) team, he was noticed by Pedro Chavez, the manager of Industriales, who recruited him to play for Industriales. (They were the Cuban equivalent of the New York Yankees.)

El Duque’s debut for Industriales in 1986 was a total disaster. Entering as a reliever in the seventh inning with the score tied and the bases loaded against Pinar del Rio, Orlando’s assignment was to face Cuban legend Luis Giraldo Casanova. El Duque recalled, “The catcher called for a curve two or three times and I said, ‘No, no, no.’ I wanted the fastball.”12 Casanova proceeded to hit a grand slam, leaving Orlando feeling as if he was worthless. Yet he also credited that as the moment that made him a pitcher.

After 10 full seasons in Cuban baseball, El Duque had a record of 126 wins and 47 losses. His .728 winning percentage was the best all-time in island league history.13

On October 28, 1996, the walls came crashing down on Orlando when the Cuban government banished him and two other Cuban ballplayers from baseball for life. The ban followed a wave of defections by Cuban baseball players, including Orlando’s half-brother Liván, who had defected in 1995 to the United States. Angered by the defections, and by individuals who aided and abetted the defectors, the Cuban Sports Ministry decreed the banishment on the basis that Orlando and the other two Cuban ballplayers had consorted with a Cuban American sports agent who had urged them to defect.

As a result of the disgrace, Orlando’s wife, whom he married in 1989, Norma Elvira Manzo Ibanez, and with whom he had two daughters, Yahumara Hernández Manzo (born March 15, 1990) and Stheffi Hernández Manzo (born July 15, 1995) proceeded to leave and divorce him.

With his livelihood stripped away and labeled as a traitor to his country, El Duque found himself living in a small, windowless gray cinder-block room, an extension of the home of the parents of his new girlfriend, Noris Bosch.14 He continued to play baseball in neighborhood leagues situated on cow pastures, acting as a third baseman and manager of his team. Orlando found a job as a rehabilitation therapist at the same psychiatric hospital where his mother had worked. The pay was 207 pesos a month, equivalent to $8.62 in 2024 US dollars.

If El Duque felt defeated, he didn’t show it. His attitude was perpetually optimistic. He would run the streets of town every morning shouting his favorite phrase, “Todo bien” (all good), to people he met. A reporter quoted him as saying, “I have to train every day without fail. If I don’t, I’m defeated. I’m finished. I keep the arms and the legs strong. My mind is strong. I know I will pitch again.”15

Orlando’s savior came in the form of a 66-year-old great-uncle on his mother’s side, Ocilio Cruz, who had arrived in Miami from Cuba after having spent 15 years in a Cuban prison for being part of an anti-Castro group. Having kept tabs on his grandnephew, Cruz, who was known to family and friends as Tio, was determined to free Orlando from Fidel Castro’s grasp. He used his connections as a private investigator to deliver $4,000 to El Duque, who then tasked his best friend in Cuba, Osmany Lorenzo, to hire an escape vessel.

Orlando and Noris began their escape on December 25, 1997, during Cuba’s first legal Christmas since 1969, when people would likely be traveling around, decreasing the chances that government officials would be out questioning citizens. Their escape vessel was a 30-foot fishing boat powered by a 480-horsepower diesel engine, owned by a fisherman named Juan Carlos Romero. In addition to the $4,000 payment, Juan Carlos was promised that if he secured the boat, then he and his wife would be guaranteed to get into the United States and a job would be waiting for him when they arrived. In addition to El Duque and Noris, as well as Juan Carlos and his wife, Geidy, the passenger list included El Duque’s cousin Joel Pedroso and Osmany Lorenzo, as well as Alberto Hernández.16

After attending a wedding reception earlier in the day, Orlando and Noris, along with Joel Pedroso and Alberto Hernández, piled into a Chevy and headed off on a five-hour drive to the town of Caibarien, where the escape boat awaited. Along the way they stopped to pick up a man named Lenin Rivero who had made separate arrangements with Juan Carlos to leave Cuba on the boat.

The Cuban defectors arrived at the home of Juan Carlos around 5 A.M. on December 26. After receiving the “all clear” signal from a fisherman friend of Juan Carlos, El Duque and the others proceeded to the launch point, Conuco Cay, and waded into the waters to board the fishing vessel.17

El Duque and the other passengers spent the first four hours of the trip staying motionless on the deck while Juan Carlos and his wife maneuvered the boat safely out of Cuban waters to the Bahamian island of Anguilla Cay, where a transfer boat arranged by El Duque’s granduncle Tio was to be awaiting to take them to Key Biscayne, Florida. But the transfer boat was not present and Juan Carlos’s partners needed to return the fishing boat back to Cuba. El Duque and the other passengers were dropped off at Anguilla Cay, hoping the transfer boat would soon arrive and with very little provisions in hand.

The next morning, the transfer boat had still not arrived. The passengers subsisted on the small amount of canned Spam they brought as well as sugar water and peeled conch shells scavenged from the island rocks. Discovering a rafter’s graveyard while wandering the shoreline, they were able to secure tent parts, wood, and a charcoal stove, enabling them to start a fire.

In truth, Tio tried hard to get a transfer boat to his grandnephew. However, each attempt he made failed. One boat launched and quickly took on water. Another attempt involved a volunteer aviator group called Brothers to the Rescue who flew a plane to Anguilla Cay but did not find El Duque and the others because they had been hiding among the island’s palmetto trees believing that if they were discovered by the US Coast Guard, they would be sent back to Cuba.18

Finally, after three days on the island, a helicopter suddenly appeared. El Duque and the others waved their arms to signal the chopper. Though the pilot acknowledged their waves, the helicopter left, not to be seen again. In the early hours of the next morning, a boat arrived, lowering a raft for the Cuban defectors to board. The boat later transferred the passengers to a Coast Guard boat out of Miami.

El Duque and the others were elated that they were being taken to the United States before noticing the ship had changed direction toward Havana, striking fear in their hearts. El Duque tried to explain to the Coast Guard officers that he was the brother of Florida Marlins pitcher Liván Hernández in hopes that it would aid their cause to get to the United States. However, what really mattered in this incident was the location where El Duque and the others were picked up. Because El Duque’s group was discovered on Bahamian soil, they would be transported to the Bahamas.

While the Bahamian authorities weighed the situation, which included the fact that the Bahamas had a repatriation agreement with Cuba, El Duque and the others were placed in a detention center.

Incredibly, the next day a press conference was scheduled at the Bahamas immigration office, attended by the Miami press corps, a camera crew from CNN, and reporters from both the New York Times and the Washington Post, as well as El Duque’s granduncle Tio. Also present was Joe Cubas, the man who had been responsible for aiding and abetting the defection of Orlando’s half-brother Livan.

It was Cubas who concocted the idea of the press conference, hoping to cast El Duque and the others as political refugees and shame the Bahamians into releasing the Cuban defectors. Cubas advised the Cubans to keep pressing for political asylum. When the press conference concluded, the Bahamians agreed that no deportations would happen while they considered the case.

El Duque’s next move was perhaps his brightest: He made a collect phone call to the Cuban American National Foundation in Miami, where a woman named Ninoska Pérez took the call. Upon hearing the situation, Pérez quickly connected with both the press as well as one of the Foundation’s more influential members, Gerardo Capo, a Miami developer who just happened to be vacationing in the Bahamas. Collective media pressure, combined with individual pressures from Capo and Cubas influenced the Bahamians to go against their own repatriation agreement with the Cuban government and stay the deportation.19

The Cuban American National Foundation now shifted their rescue efforts to the US government and the mobilization of South Florida politicians. Thanks in large part to the deputy assistant secretary of state for public affairs, Lula Rodriguez, within 24 hours the US government extended humanitarian parole to El Duque, Alberto, and Noris. However, the other five Cuban defectors were left to fend for themselves.

Not wanting to leave his compadres behind, El Duque enlisted Joe Cubas’ assistance to secure seven visas from both Nicaragua and Costa Rica, even though it meant having to give up the American visa he had just been granted. In the end, El Duque and the other Cuban refugees left the Bahamas on a flight to Costa Rica.

Within a day, Cubas was able to get Orlando his residency papers in Costa Rica, allowing him to be declared a free agent. Cubas then set up a major-league tryout with invitations sent out to all 30 clubs.

The tryout was held at the Antonio Escarre, a broken-down ballpark in the middle of San José, the Costa Rican capital. Sixty-two scouts showed up along with some media. El Duque’s fastballs ranged from 88 to 91 miles per hour. Though many scouts did not appear impressed with his showing, Gordon Blakely, the vice president of international scouting for the New York Yankees, most certainly was. Gordon was entranced by El Duque’s accomplishments when he starred for the Cuban National Team. An excerpt from the summary notes of El Duque’s tryout performance, written by Blakely and fellow Yankee scout Lin Garrett, went as follows:20

Returning from the tryout, Blakely and Garrett met with Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and his brain trust and exclaimed that El Duque was a winner. They made it known that while listed as a 28-year-old, El Duque was likely really 32, but that he was a great athlete who could pitch for five or six years.

When the discussion around potential pricetag came up, Blakley told Steinbrenner that an offer of $6 million US or more might be required, to which Steinbrenner replied “Okay, Go get him.”21

Negotiations between the Yankees and Cubas resulted in a major-league contract worth $6.6 million over four years with a $1 million signing bonus.

Thrilled to be pitching again, the charismatic El Duque arrived at the Yankees’ Tampa spring-training facilities in March 1998. He brought with him his distinctive delivery that included an acrobatic leg kick on which his left knee came up, almost brushing his chin, with his cap pulled down and his menacing eyes staring at the batter just above his glove. According to Yankees general manager Brian Cashman, El Duque “just had this presence about him like he was (basketball legend) Michael Jordan.”22

Hernández started the 1998 season pitching for the Yankees’ High-A affiliate Tampa Yankees, pitching in two games before being advanced to the Triple-A Columbus Clippers. Thanks to the actions of a Jack Russell Terrier named Veronica, El Duque made his major-league debut on June 3, 1998, in front of a Yankee Stadium crowd of 27,291. Veronica belonged to the mother of Yankees pitcher David Cone. She bit Cone on his index finger, forcing manager Joe Torre to pencil in a replacement starting pitcher to take Cone’s turn in the rotation.23

El Duque’s debut as a Yankee was spectacular. He struck out the first batter he faced on his way to pitching seven innings against the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, earning the victory, yielding just one earned run, a home run by future Hall of Famer Fred McGriff.24

In a postgame interview with the Madison Square Garden television network, El Duque was asked what message he might send to Fidel Castro, to which he replied, “I would not say anything to him because I would not waste my time standing in front of him.”25 Because of El Duque’s compelling performance, the Yankees shifted pitcher Ramiro Mendoza to the bullpen, freeing up a regular spot in the rotation for Hernández.

In June of 1998 the Yankees, who went on to win 125 games including the playoffs, were already in top form without El Duque, but he helped make a great team ever greater. Before his arrival, the Yankees’ starting pitchers had a collective ERA of 4.14. After his arrival, the ERA dropped to 3.48 across the remaining regular-season and playoff games.

As a pitcher, El Duque was a workhorse because, as he put it, “In Cuba, you don’t have a relief pitcher every time out. In Cuba, it’s win or die.”26 Here is how Joe Torre described what occurred during El Duque’s fifth start when Torre went to the mound to take the ball from him after he had thrown 141 pitches, allowing just one run on two singles to the New York Mets: “I remember I took the ball from him and he didn’t let it go. And he just had this confused look on his face. I came to realize that he had never really been taken out of a game before. But he was a master. He could paint the corners with the best of them.”27

Yankees catcher Jorge Posada, who caught 21 of El Duque’s 23 starts, including the playoffs, in 1998, described El Duque in this way: “He was just perfection. He was so … well, perfection is a word, but I’m not sure it’s the word I’m looking for. He wasn’t nervous. He went through hell and now he’s living his childhood dream. He was just saying, ‘I’m here. This is the best time of my life and I’m not going to take anything for granted.’ Yeah, I guess perfection is the word I wanted to use.”28

Hernández ended the 1998 season with a record of 12-4 and a 3.13 ERA with 131 strikeouts and a 1.17 WHIP in 141 innings, which earned him a fourth-place showing in the Rookie of the Year vote. Besides his debut, his most memorable moment of the season was his season-saving victory in Game Four of the American League Championship Series over the Cleveland Indians.

A dominant team like the 1998 Yankees would not be remembered in legacy fashion without winning the World Series. This goal was very much in doubt in Game Four of the ALCS with the Yankees trailing the Cleveland Indians two games to one in a seven-game series. According to the book The 1998 Yankees: The Inside Story of the Greatest Baseball Team Ever by Jack Curry, the Record of Hackensack, New Jersey, reported how Steinbrenner approached El Duque to give him a pep talk about the most critical game of the season. The Boss told El Duque, “If you can’t stop them, we’re through.” The cocksure pitcher waved his hand at the owner and said “Mañana, no problema.”29

Though he hadn’t pitched in 15 days, Hernández threw seven scoreless innings in a 4-0 win that enabled the Yankees to breathe a sigh of relief. Part of El Duque’s success that day can be credited to David Cone. Cone was known to be a creative pitcher and he marveled at the creativity of his teammate El Duque, who could throw side-arm, three-quarters, and over-the-top – all at different speeds that would tempt and tease batters. Watching Hernández warm up for a game in Oakland, Cone noted the lack of aggressiveness he was showing with his changeup, a pitch that he had not thrown to perfection in games and thus was no longer relying on as a weapon on the mound. Cone marched up to Hernández and said, “Finito. Cambio. Finito.” El Duque comprehended the advice which was to “Finish the changeup” by throwing it the same way you throw a fastball.30

Having had to leave his mother and two daughters behind in Cuba when he made his great escape, it must have felt like a miracle to El Duque when his agent, Joe Cubas, was able to make the needed connections for Fidel Castro to grant 30-day visas to Orlando’s mother, daughters, and first wife to come to New York to visit with El Duque and attend the Yankees’ 1998 championship parade.

El Duque continued to be a mainstay in the Yankees’ starting rotation from 1999 through 2002, his postseason heroics shining bright yet again in 1999, when he won the ALCS MVP and finished the postseason with a 3-0 record and a 1.20 ERA as the Yankees won back-to-back World Series titles.

With a glut of starting pitchers and a need in the bullpen, the Yankees made a three-team trade in January 2003, sending Hernández to the Chicago White Sox, who then sent him to the Montreal Expos. A rotator cuff injury, however, sidelined El Duque for the entire 2003 season.

In 2004, free-agent Hernández rejoined the Yankees, for whom he started 15 games after recovering from the rotator cuff injury. He completed the season with an 8-2 record and a 3.30 ERA.

The majority of El Duque’s postseason appearances came as a starter, but this wasn’t the case in 2005 after he signed with the White Sox. He finished the regular season with an unspectacular 5.12 ERA, having started 22 of 24 games in which he appeared, but this didn’t matter to White Sox manager Ozzie Guillén, who opted to bring El Duque and his postseason experience into Game Three of the ALCS as a reliever against the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park.

Reflecting upon the situation years later during an interview with NBC Sports Chicago, White Sox pitching coach Don Cooper said, “There’s 45,000 people in the stands with tight a——-,” Every fan’s got the tight a——. Every coach, every player’s got the tight a——. The only a—— that wasn’t tight was El Duque’s.”31

In the sixth inning, the bases were loaded with no outs and the White Sox holding a precarious 4-3 lead. The pressure on El Duque was immense and the escape act that ensued was epic, later even immortalized on the 2005 World Series monument sculpture erected at US Cellular Field. Hernández got Red Sox catcher Jason Varitek to pop out, battled the next batter, Tony Graffanino, for 10 pitches before getting him to pop out on a full count, and finished the inning by striking out Johnny Damon on a checked swing. El Duque proceeded to come back out and pitch both the seventh and eighth innings, preserving the one-run lead.

El Duque made just one appearance in the White Sox World Series four-game sweep of the Houston Astros, coming on in relief in the ninth inning of Game Three. He pitched one inning, walking four batters, striking out two, and exiting after facing one batter in the 10th inning without giving up a run.

Not long after the World Series celebration in Chicago ended, the White Sox completed a trade with the Arizona Diamondbacks, sending Hernández, reliever Luis Vizcaíno, and outfield prospect Chris Young for starting pitcher Javier Vázquez.

El Duque’s time with the Diamondbacks lasted only two months. In May 2006 he was traded to the New York Mets for reliever Jorge Julio. Hernández made 20 starts for the Mets, finishing with a 9-7 record and a 4.09 ERA. With the Mets winning the National League East Division and El Duque having had a very successful month of September, manager Willie Randolph named him the Game One starter for the National League Division Series. But Hernández experienced right-calf discomfort while running sprints as the Mets tuned up for the series against the Los Angeles Dodgers. The injury was bad enough that he was removed from the postseason roster.32

Though El Duque’s 2007 season with the Mets included bouts with injuries, he was able to make 24 starts, compiling a record of 9-5 with a 3.72 ERA and 128 strikeouts in 147⅔ innings.

Hernández underwent foot surgery after the 2007 season that required lengthy rehabilitation. He was unable to make any starts for the Mets in 2008. Late in the season, he suffered a toe injury that required season-ending surgery. He became a free agent at the end of the 2008 season.

In 2009 and 2010, El Duque tried to make comebacks, pitching for minor-league teams, initially for the Texas Rangers and then for the Washington Nationals. He never got a major-league call-up by either club, and announced his retirement on August 18, 2011.33

Overall, Orlando “El Duque” Hernández spent nine seasons in the big leagues pitching for the Yankees, White Sox, Diamondbacks, and Mets, compiling a record of 90 wins and 65 losses, an ERA of 4.13, and a total of 23.1 WAR.

His career regular-season ERA was in line with the third/fourth starter Yankees scouts had projected him to be, but it was under the bright lights of the postseason where El Duque truly shined as an ace. In 15 postseason series, he went 9-3 with a 2.55 ERA and 107 strikeouts in 106 innings pitched, having contributed to four World Series titles, three with the Yankees and one with the White Sox.34 In 1999 he was named the ALCS MVP for his performances against the Boston Red Sox.

After retirement, Hernández has spent time as an analyst for ESPN’s Spanish-language radio and TV. He has also participated in Yankees’ Old Timer’s Day events at Yankee Stadium as well as in Yankees’ Fantasy Camp.

On Valentine’s Day 2000, Orlando Hernández married his girlfriend, dancer Noris Bosch, in Coral Gables, Florida. As of July 2024, their son, also named Orlando Hernández, was a pitcher for the Florida International University Panthers’ baseball team.35 During the 2024 season, Hernández made 13 appearances out of the bullpen, posting a 1.57 ERA, the lowest among FIU relievers. He was named to the Conference USA Second Team All-Conference squad.36

Last revised: March 1, 2025

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com.

Notes

1 Steve Fainaru and Ray Sánchez, The Duke of Havana (New York: Villard Books, 2001), xix.

2 Fainaru and Sánchez, 7.

3 Fainaru and Sánchez, 24.

4 Fainaru and Sánchez, 26.

5 Fainaru and Sánchez, 3.

6 Fainaru and Sánchez, 31.

7 Fainaru and Sánchez, 7.

8 Fainaru and Sánchez, 8.

9 Fainaru and Sánchez, 32.

10 Fainaru and Sánchez, 34.

11 Fainaru and Sánchez, 35.

12 Fainaru and Sánchez, 36.

13 Peter C. Bjarkman, “The Hernandez Brothers: Livan and Orlando,” SABR BioProject, https://sabr.org/bioproj/topic/the-hernandez-brothers-livan-and-orlando/, Accessed December 30, 2023.

14 Fainaru and Sánchez, xxi.

15 Fainaru and Sánchez, 165.

16 Fainaru and Sánchez, 192-193.

17 Fainaru and Sánchez, 197-199.

18 Fainaru and Sánchez, 207-208.

19 Fainaru and Sánchez, 215-216.

20 Fainaru and Sánchez, 230-231.

21 Fainaru and Sánchez, 232.

22 Jack Curry, The 1998 Yankees – The Inside Story of the Greatest Baseball Team Ever (New York: Twelve, 2023), 76.

23 Curry, 81.

24 Eric Chesterton, “20 years ago, El Duque Made His Major League Debut for the Yankees,” Cut 4 by MLB.com, June 3, 2018, https://www.mlb.com/cut4/20-years-ago-el-duque-made-his-debut-for-the-yankees-c279576846, Accessed December 21, 2023.

25 Curry, 82.

26 Curry, 84.

27 Curry, 84.

28 Curry, 85.

29 Curry, 196.

30 Curry, 95.

31 Vinnie Duber, “White Sox 2005 Rewind: ‘The Only a— That Wasn’t Tight Was El Duque’s,’” NBCSportsChicago.com, May 25, 2020, https://www.nbcsportschicago.com/mlb/chicago-white-sox/white-sox-2005-rewind-the-only-a-that-wasnt-tight-was-el-duques/381281/, Accessed December 21, 2023.

32 Associated Press, “Hernandez’s Injury Rocks Mets’ Rotation,” Denver Post, https://www.denverpost.com/2006/10/03/hernandezs-injury-rocks-mets-rotation/, Accessed December 21, 2023.

33 Stowe.

34 Rich Stowe, “Orlando ‘El Duque’ Hernandez: Former New York Yankees Postseason Hero to Retire,” Bleacher Report.com, August 17, 2011, https://bleacherreport.com/articles/809071-orlando-el-duque-hernandez-former-new-york-yankees-postseason-hero-to-retire, Accessed December 21, 2023.

35 Mike Depasquale, “Sons of 2 Former MLB Players Aim to Carve Own Path at FIU,” WSVN.com, February 6, 2023, https://wsvn.com/sports/sons-of-2-former-mlb-players-aim-to-carve-own-path-at-fiu/, Accessed December 21, 2023.

36 https://fiusports.com/sports/baseball/roster/orlando-hernandez/11303, Accessed July 17, 2024.