Julio Perez (minors14)

Julio Alberto Perez

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 6' 2", Weight 220 lb.

• Born August 19, 1991 in Cansahcab, Yucatan MEX

BR Minors page

Biographical Information

Julio Perez is a first baseman who played mainly in the Mexican League starting in 2011. His first professional season was with the closest team to his hometown, the Leones de Yucatan, as a 19-year-old in 2011. Playing sparingly, he still hit .297 in 19 games with a couple of homers. That raised the interest of the Pittsburgh Pirates, who signed him to a contract after the season. He spent 2012 in the Dominican Summer League appearing with both the DSL Pirates 1 and DSL Pirates 2, and hit a combined .244/.352/.415 in 44 games, which was apparently not enough for the Pirates to bring him to a U.S.-based minor league. He thus returned to Mexico, where he has played ever since. However, he never managed to establish himself as a regular.

In 2013, he was back with Yucatan, hitting .246 in 33 games. In 2014, he played 20 games for the Pericos de Puebla, hitting .276. The team made it to the League Championship, where they faced the Diablos Rojos del Mexico. In the final game of the series on September 11th, his teammates managed to take an 8-6 lead in the top of the 9th inning, thanks to a three-run rally highlighted by a two-run homer by Jon Del Campo off closer Manny Acosta, only to see things unravel in the bottom of the inning: singles by Sergio Gastélum and John Lindsey put two runners on base, and Julio then committed a costly error to load the bases. A single and a sacrifice fly tied the game, and Mexico City completed a four-game sweep when Juan Carlos Gamboa hit a game-winning homer in the bottom of the 10th. He then played sparingly the next two seasons, appearing in just 3 and 4 games in the top league, and none at all in 2017.

He made his return to la Liga in 2018 with the Bravos de Leon and finally got to see some consequent action. That year, when the season was separated into two distinct halves, he played a total of 54 games and hit .287 with 7 homers, including batting .395 in the second portion of the season. In 2019, he hit .262 with another 7 homers in 58 games. Just as he was finally getting established, however, the COVID-19 pandemic intervened and wiped out the 2020 season. He returned to Leon in 2021, hitting .232 in 29 games, and then spent 2022 with the Rieleros de Aguascalientes, where he hit .314 in 31 games, having settled into the role of pinch-hitter.