Elite League: Portuarios enters green zone for postseason

Havana, January 21 (RHC) - Right-handers Yadián Martínez (Portuarios) and Carlos Juan Viera (Agricultores) will be the starting pitchers this Saturday in the sixth game of the playoffs for the crown in the First Elite League of Cuban Baseball, whose final games will be played at the Mártires de Barbados Stadium in Bayamo (Granma).

After spending most of the qualifying phase in sixth and last place in the standings, Portuarios - which groups together players from Industriales and Mayabeque - has made an impressive rise and is only one win away from the title.

The pupils of young mentor Michael Gonzalez still dominate the final playoffs 3 wins to 2, so they would only need one win to be crowned champions.

Agricultores - with players from Granma and Las Tunas - needs to win the two remaining games (Saturday and Sunday, if necessary) in order to win the title.

In the most recent game - played at the Nelson Fernández stadium in Mayabeque - Agricultores closed the gap against Portuarios, winning by a resounding 19-5 score, in a game in which seven home runs were hit, two each by Yordanis Alarcón, Rafael Viñales and Alexquemer Sánchez, and one by Guillermo Avilés.

The Elite League champion would become the Cuban squad for the next Caribbean Series, scheduled for early February in Caracas, Venezuela.