Pitcher Raul Carrillo of the Yucatán Leones.Photo: Courtesy
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Yucatán Leones Close Out a Historically Bad Season

ByYucatán Magazine

The Yucatán Leones head into the final week of the 2026 season with a 31-56 record, on pace for the franchise’s worst finish since 2014, a steep fall for a team that won Mexican League titles as recently as 2022.

The Leones split a Saturday doubleheader against the Pericos de Puebla at Parque Kukulcán, taking the opener 1-0 behind veteran right-hander Raúl Carrillo before dropping the nightcap 2-1. Puebla, which enters the postseason at 47-41, is one of the South Zone’s playoff-bound clubs this year. Yucatán is not.

That gap says a lot about how far the Leones have slipped. The franchise won five league championships, most recently in 2018 and 2022, and had not missed the playoffs in more than a decade until last year, when the team stumbled to a sixth-place finish in the South Zone at 42-50 and was swept out of the first playoff round by the Diablos Rojos del México.

Yucatán’s front office responded with a near-total roster overhaul for 2026, bringing in more than 20 new players and hiring Sergio Omar Gastélum as manager in March. But the results were worse, not better. By mid-May, with the team buried in last place, the Leones fired Gastélum and turned to Hensley Meulens, a longtime major league hitting coach making his debut as a manager.

The change hasn’t reversed the slide. If Yucatán’s current pace holds through its remaining games, this would be the team’s losingest season since 2014, when the Leones finished 46-64 under brothers Erick and Juan José Arellano.

There has been a silver lining to the lost season: player development. The Leones have used the freefall to get a long look at young talent, debuting 12 players in the Mexican League this year. Three more arrived Saturday, when pitchers Dereck López and Jason Pérez and catcher Andrés Garza, all products of the Bucaneros de Los Cabos’ Liga Norte de México championship run, made their first LMB appearances. López, 16, struck out the side to end the nightcap’s opening frame. Garza, 19 and a former San Diego Padres farmhand, threw out two runners trying to steal.

Carrillo’s outing in the opener was one of the few bright spots for the veterans. He allowed two hits over five innings for his third win of the season, and relievers Erubiel Armenta and Ricardo Rodríguez closed out Yucatán’s fifth shutout of the year.

El Pueblo Mérida

The Leones close the regular season this week: Sunday at home against Puebla, then a three-game series at the Guerreros de Oaxaca starting Tuesday, where Yucateco right-hander Fabrizio Ramírez is set to make his own LMB debut.

The Leones by the Numbers

  • 2026 record entering final week: 31-56
  • 2025 finish: 42-50, sixth in South Zone, swept in first playoff round
  • Last losing season before 2026: 2014 (46-64)
  • Mexican League titles: five (1957, 1984, 2006, 2018, 2022)
  • Managers this season: two (Sergio Gastélum, then Hensley Meulens)
  • Rookies debuted in 2026: 12
  • Final regular-season series: at Guerreros de Oaxaca, starting Tuesday

With reporting from La Jornada Maya and Posta MX Deportes

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