Yuli Gurriel

Did You Know?

• Gurriel's brother Lourdes Jr. signed with the Toronto Blue Jays on November 12, 2016.
• Gurriel is better at batting against breaking balls away from the bat, especially sliders.

Baseball career

Gurriel led the Cuban National Series in hits and runs scored during the 2004–05 season. The following year, he led the league in RBI, runs, and triples, and his 27 home runs were one short of the record of 28. He batted .327 with a .676 slugging percentage that season, playing for Sancti Spíritus and Industriales. On May 11, 2014, he signed a one-year contract with the Yokohama DeNA BayStars, joining at midseason and batting .305 with 11 home runs and 30 RBIs in 62 games.

In February 2016, Gurriel and his brother Lourdes Jr. defected after competing in the Caribbean Series in the Dominican Republic and relocated to Haiti to establish residency. While in Haiti in June 2016, he met future Astros teammate Yordan Alvarez. Major League Baseball declared Gurriel eligible to sign as a free agent that June. Nearly ten years earlier, ESPN.com had erroneously reported that Gurriel and Eduardo Paret had defected into Colombia; Gurriel refuted this on August 1, 2006, stating he returned to Cuba immediately after the tournament.

On July 16, 2016, Gurriel signed a five-year, $47.5 million contract with the Houston Astros. He played 15 minor league games that year, moving from the Gulf Coast Astros to the Lancaster JetHawks, then to the Corpus Christi Hooks, and finally to the Fresno Grizzlies. He was recalled to the major league roster on August 21. In his first 19 games with the Astros, he batted .344 with three home runs and eight RBIs, playing mostly first and third base.

International career

Gurriel represented Cuba before his defection, helping the national team win a gold medal at the 2004 Summer Olympics and World Cup of Baseball championships in 2003 and 2005. During the 2005 World Cup, he led all batters with eight home runs. At the 2006 World Baseball Classic, he played second base and struck out for the final out in Cuba's championship loss to Japan, batting .273 with a .342 on-base percentage and .515 slugging percentage. In the finals of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, he again made the final out by grounding into a double play against South Korea.

He played for Cuba in the 2009 WBC as their third baseman, batting .333 with two home runs and six RBIs. In December 2023, Gurriel was named to FEPCUBE's "Patria y Vida" team for the inaugural Intercontinental Series in Barranquilla, Colombia, which would have been his first time representing Cuba in an international tournament since the 2011 Pan American Games, but the tournament was cancelled due to diplomatic pressure from the Cuban government.