Nearly halfway complete with their 2016 Spring Training schedule, the Los Angeles Dodgers will be without first baseman Adrian Gonzalez until next week. Gonzalez is going to play for Team Mexico in the World Baseball Classic Qualifier, which begins Thursday.
Mexico is the highest-ranked baseball nation that has yet to qualify for the 2017 WBC, which takes place in March 2017. They’ll compete against the Czech Republic, Germany and Nicaragua from March 17-20 at Estadio B-Air in Mexicali, Mexico, in an attempt to earn a tournament berth
While Gonzalez was born in San Diego, he has played for Team Mexico in 2006, 2009 and 2013. His inclusion on the qualifying team is no surprise as his older brother, Edgar, manages the Mexican national team.
Gonzalez was in the Dodgers’ lineup, who were considered the road team, on Tuesday as they faced the Chicago White Sox in the second meeting with their Camelback Ranch co-tenant. However, prior to the game, Gonzalez supplied lunch for his teammates by catering a taco truck.
“He brought in tacos and they were really good, so that was nice,” Kiké Hernandez said of his day’s lunch. The truck came from El Guero Canelo, a Mexican restaurant with three locations plus a meat market in Tucson, Ariz., and one location in Phoenix.
The gesture wasn’t necessarily in relation to Gonzalez’s forthcoming absence from Camelback Ranch, however, nor was it a first and last time occurrence. “I was going to get it regardless,” he said.
“[Leaving Tuesday] made it easier to pick today as the day, and I’ll get them again at some point later in the spring.”
