On the Road with Candido
Candy Maldonado is the final member of the v26 Club and it feels like he signifies a changing of the guard. He is the first profiled inductee to play into the v28 era and came relatively close to playing in the Interleague era. Whereas previous inductees felt like players of the 1980s or earlier, Candy has a more 1990s feel. My feeling mostly comes from collecting baseball cards in the junk wax era and equating the Graig Nettles and Jack Clark-type players as “old” while Candy wasn’t old in the same way. Before this article, I couldn’t have told you he played for the Dodgers because baseball before 1986 is enigmatic in my mind.
Speaking of baseball cards, on the reverse of his 1988 Topps Big baseball card, Candy Maldonado identifies travelling as one of his favorite activities. Let’s take a tour of Maldonado’s career which has quite a few unique or interesting sites to see.
Pre-trip and Years 1-5: Chavez Ravine
Candy Maldonado started off in professional baseball as a very good minor league player on teams with other very good minor league players. He hit for average and hit for power both in the States and in his native Puerto Rico. Like other inductees before him, Maldonado seemed poised for a big breakout.
His first season up with the Dodgers in 1981 only netted him twelve plate appearances and no home runs. 1982 brought even less big league exposure with only four plate appearances. In 1983 he was slowly positioning himself as the right fielder for the Dodgers. In sixty-eight plate appearances he netted his first big league home run.
LEDGER ONE: August 15, 1983 vs San Francisco Giants
More regular playing time was on deck for 1984. Maldonado increased his playing time to the tune of more than 100 games and hit five more home runs that included four ledgers.
LEDGER TWO: May 6, 1984 (Game 1) at Pittsburgh Pirates
LEDGER THREE: June 1, 1984 vs Houston Astros
LEDGER FOUR: June 22, 1984 at Atlanta Braves
LEDGER FIVE: August 29, 1984 at New York Mets
1985 was Maldonado’s last season in Los Angeles and a near copy of the previous season in terms of games and home runs, except Maldonado had shifted to play center field.
LEDGER SIX: April 21, 1985 at San Diego Padres
LEDGER SEVEN: July 14, 1985 at Chicago Cubs
LEDGER EIGHT: August 21, 1985 at Philadelphia Phillies
The ledger against the Phillies came in a game where Maldonado had five hits, an uncommon occurrence for ledger hitters. Maldonado’s career as a Dodger was ultimately lacking and was traded to the Giants after the season concluded.
Years 6-9: The Golden Gate Bridge
We learned from the ‘88 Topps Big card that Maldonado was cited as San Francisco’s team MVP in 1986. He hadn’t put up team MVP-caliber numbers in Los Angeles, but the change in scenery gave him incredible boost to capture league MVP votes in 1986. Maldonado raised his home run total to 18 home runs alongside 85 RBI. He added three more ledger home runs, but he still had not maxed out against the National League.
LEDGER NINE: August 11, 1986 at Cincinnati Reds
LEDGER TEN: September 4, 1986 at Montreal Expos
LEDGER ELEVEN: September 28, 1986 vs Los Angeles Dodgers
His NL max-out ledger would come in 1987 in a way that had yet to be seen from a vClub inductee. In the game Maldonado hit the following sequence: line out in the first, triple in third, ground out in the fifth. He hit his ledger in the seventh inning. The Giants’ bats came alive late with Maldonado hitting a single in the eighth inning and an RBI double in the ninth. Candy was the 212th player to hit for the cycle and this would only be the twenty-second time since 1901 that a ledger was part of a cycle.
LEDGER TWELVE: May 4, 1987 at St. Louis Cardinals
As someone who liked to travel, Maldonado showed it as a hitter. Only three of his first twelve ledgers came while Maldonado played in his home stadium. Over the course of his career, he was a significantly better hitter on the road in general splitting .268 on the road but only .239 at home1. Interestingly, he split his career home runs right down the middle with 73 apiece.
Maldonado played two more seasons in San Francisco before seeking out a free agent deal. In a refreshing change of pace, the nearly 30-year-old career National Leaguer was going to the American League and wasn’t going to be a designated hitter. He would land in Cleveland on a deal prior to the 1990 season.
Year 10: An On-Fire Cuyahoga River
Maldonado was ready to go from the start, hitting his first home run with the Indians in his second game.
LEDGER THIRTEEN: April 13, 1990 at Chicago White Sox
His next two ledgers would come later in the month in back-to-back games, one on the road and one at home.
LEDGER FOURTEEN: April 26, 1990 at Toronto Blue Jays
LEDGER FIFTEEN: April 27, 1990 vs Minnesota Twins
He continued through the season hitting home runs and ledgers at a pretty good clip. By the time the last game of the season rolled around, he had amassed 22 home runs, 95 RBI and a .273 average. It was one of the best seasons of his career.
LEDGER SIXTEEN: May 6, 1990 (Game 1) vs Texas Rangers
LEDGER SEVENTEEN: May 16, 1990 vs Oakland Athletics
LEDGER EIGHTEEN: May 20, 1990 vs Seattle Mariners
LEDGER NINETEEN: June 17, 1990 vs Milwaukee Brewers
LEDGER TWENTY: June 29, 1990 vs California Angels
LEDGER TWENTY-ONE: August 4, 1990 at New York Yankees
LEDGER TWENTY-TWO: August 11, 1990 vs Detroit Tigers
But on the last day of the 1990 season Maldonado found himself still needing ledgers against the Royals, Orioles, and Red Sox.
Day Trip Excursion: The Daniel Boone National Forest
Daniel Boone was an American pioneer and explorer. He was born on November 2, 1734, in Pennsylvania. Boone is most famous for exploring and helping settle Kentucky, carving a trail called the Wilderness Road. He faced many challenges, including fighting with Native American tribes and surviving in the wilderness. Daniel Boone became a symbol of the adventurous spirit of early America.
Daniel Boone fathered twelve children. Those children had children of their own and so on and so forth. Seven generations later, one of Boone’s descendants stood atop the pitcher’s mound at Municipal Stadium in Cleveland to make his first career start.
Danny Boone had one of the more interesting baseball careers. He debuted with the Padres in 1981 and was effectively out of baseball at the end of 1982 after a stint with the Astros. In his newly found downtime he developed a knuckleball. He joined the Senior Professional Baseball Association in 1989 and found enough success there to catch the eye of the Baltimore Orioles – eight years after he left the MLB.
The Orioles used him in three relief appearances. Then in what should have been the last game of the season (but wasn’t because the lockout extended the season by a couple games) they sent him out as the starter for the second game of a doubleheader.
Things went well through the first four innings, but Candy Maldonado punched a solo shot…
LEDGER TWENTY-THREE: September 30, 1990 (Game 2) vs Baltimore Orioles
…in the fifth and that began the end of Boone’s time in this game and sadly, his entire career. He would finish the game with a no decision and it would turn out to be the last game of his career.
Years 11 and 12: The CN Tower and a statue of The Fonz
Maldonado would parlay his excellent season with the Indians into a free agent contract with the Brewers. His playing time in Milwaukee was limited due to suddenly sagging production brought forth in part because of a broken foot. One of his five home runs was a needed ledger.
LEDGER TWENTY-FOUR: August 1, 1991 vs Kansas City Royals
In August 1991, the Blue Jays and Brewers worked out a swap that sent Maldonado to Toronto in exchange for a pair of young players. Maldonado’s signature highlights came with the Jays in the 1992 ALCS and World Series with a three home runs. But for us, the two home runs of note from his time in Toronto were the two ledgers that put him into the v26 Club.
LEDGER TWENTY-FIVE: August 12, 1991 vs Boston Red Sox
LEDGER TWENTY-SIX: August 14, 1992 at Cleveland Indians
With ledger #26, Candy set the record for least amount of elapsed time between his first and clinching ledger at one day less than a decade or 3,543 days.
Candy would return to Cleveland for another season and half after his first stint with Toronto, making his Cleveland ledger his only home run against them. He would also have a second stint with Toronto and wrapped up his career with the Rangers. But immediately after his 1992 season with the Blue Jays he signed as a free agent with the Cubs.
Year 13: The Denver Zephyr
As mentioned in the intro, Maldonado is the first profiled inductee who played into the v28 era. When the Rockies and Marlins joined the National League in 1993 they closed the book on the v26 Club. Turns out Maldonado had cut it very close with his single home run against Cleveland in August 1992. But now Maldonado had a unique opportunity. He now had eligibility and opportunity to join the v28 Club as a player for the Cubs.
The Cubs made their first trip to Mile High Stadium in late April. Maldonado made good on the first half of his needed ledgers.
LEDGER TWENTY-SEVEN: April 27, 1993 at Colorado Rockies
Maldonado became the first player in history to hit twenty-seven ledger home runs in his career and was very well positioned to join the v28 Club. However, the ledger against the Marlins never happened.
The Cubs and Marlins squared off three times in May, three times in June, and four times in July. Maldonado only appeared in two of those games. Before the teams’ last three game series in September, the Cubs had traded Maldonado to Cleveland for a very important name in v30 Club lore – Glenallen Hill – which in many respects perfectly encapsulates the changing of the guard between “old timey” players and the newest generation.
This effectively closed the book on Candy Maldonado. Unlike some inductees before him, he never garnered many awards or accolades. He was never an All-Star and collected one or two votes for MVP one year. But his career is noted for consistency. He found himself in the post-season six times with three teams. After his playing career he remained near the game and he found success in the broadcasting booth.
As we to now bid farewell to the v26 Club, we look forward to what the v28 has in store. The baseball timeline tells us we have the 1993 through 1997 seasons to find our inductees.
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In fact, only one player in Maldonado’s generation – Dave Bergman – had a larger home/away split (.272 to .242).
