Genaro Llanes

Genaro Tomas Llanes Manzanares

• Born September 28, 1961

Biographical Information

Genaro Llanes was a star catcher in Nicaragua who was often on the Nicaraguan national team.

He debuted with Chinandega in 1985, hitting .262/.330/.340, following with a .289/.299/.380 campaign in '86 and .291/.327/.413 in 1987. He batted .375/.426/.628 in 1988 with 16 homers and 71 RBI in 73 games, leading the league in slugging and RBI while falling two shy of Apolinar Cruz in the home run race. Debuting with the national team that summer, he was 2 for 6 with a walk, run and a steal and handled 17 chances error-free, backing up Tomás Guzmán. In 1989, he fell to .317/.397/.560 but again led in RBI (72) while tying Julio César Sánchez for the most sac flies (7). The hard-hitting backstop again went deep 16 times, five behind leader Ramón Padilla.

In the 1990 José Antonio Huelga tournament in Cuba, he hit .550 to beat Omar Linares for the batting title. He won Silver with Nicaragua in the 1990 Central American Games. In the 1990 Baseball World Cup, he produced at a .357/.349/.595 clip with 8 RBI in 10 games, fielding .983; he tied Julio Medina for the team lead in RBI. In Nicaragua's amateur league that year, he hit .302/.391/.418 with 17 doubles and 7 homers.

Llanes hit .273 in the 1991 Pan American Games and launched a grand slam versus the Netherlands Antilles. He was at .325/.391/.425 in the 1991 Intercontinental Cup, with six runs and six RBI in ten games and throwing out five of ten would-be base-stealers. Only Rene Duarte threw out more runners stealing in the Cup, but Llanes had a better success rate. Hitting cleanup in the Bronze Medal Game, he was 1 for 6 but Nicaragua beat Taiwan in 13 innings. He beat out José R. Delgado among others as the event's All-Star catcher. That summer, he batted .314/.374/.386 with 17 doubles and 14 home runs; it was his last season of double-digit dingers.

While he fell to three homers for Chinandega in 1992, he hit .356/.423/.447. Moving to DH, he batted .370/.452/.488 between Dantos and Granada in '93. He hit .222 in the 1993 Central American and Caribbean Games, used at DH while Julio Osejo took over behind the dish. He struck out in his lone plate appearance in the 1993 Intercontinental Cup as Osejo was used at catcher and Prospero Baca and Ariel Delgado split DH. By this point, his knees were taking their poll from years of catching. He batted .360/.438/.487 between Granada and Chinandega in '94, tying for the lead with four sacrifice flies, his last time as a league leader.

In his final national team appearance, he played well as they took Gold in the 1994 Central American Games. He hit .315/.427/.452 for Granada in 1995, .346/.423/.447 in 1996 and .346/.424/.510 with 15 doubles in 1997, still a solid hitter at age 35. Moving to León in 1998, he still batted .332/.415/.454. His 11-year-run of .300 seasons ended in 1999 when he hit .250/.335/.386 for Chinandega. He finished with a .231/.375/.231 season for Norte in 2000.

He had hit .359 with 35 runs in 170 national team at-bats. He had also batted .327/.402/.469 in Nicaragua, with 95 homers and 614 RBI in 1,010 games, striking out only 244 times in 3,318 AB.