TOKYO — Mexico, a country where soccer reigns supreme, has nonetheless produced former baseball stars like Fernando Valenzuela, Bobby Ávila and Vinny Castilla.
None of them played in the Olympics.
Baseball has been absent from the Games for 13 years, and Mexico had never qualified for the tournament when it was played.
That changed on Friday, when Mexico made its Olympic debut against the Dominican Republic at Yokohama Stadium, instilling a sense of national pride back home and hope that baseball could assume a higher profile there as well.
“It’s a gift for a lot of us here now,” Oliver Perez, 39, said in Spanish.