Seattle Mariners Spanish broadcasters Julio The Cruzer Cruz (left) and Amaury Pi Gonzalez (right) as heard on KBRO 1490 in Seattle/Bremerton and KNTB AM 1480 in Tacoma, Cruzer would say “Wow” to that. (photo by the Seattle Mariners magazine)

From My Baseball Notebook: Working with The Cruzer in Seattle

That’s Amaury News and Commentary

Amaury Pi-González

Up in Seattle, during the years of Ichiro Suzuki, Jay Buhner, Edgar Martínez, and Félix Hernández, among others, I was paired with Julio “The Cruzer” Cruz on the team’s Spanish radio broadcast. Julio was the Seattle Mariners’ dream-team second baseman and the M’s original second baseman in 1977, the team’s first year in Seattle. Julio was truly a fan favorite in Seattle. He excelled at defense and was fast on the bases; he held the Mariners’ stolen-base record for years, until Ichiro Suzuki tied it and later broke it.

An affable man, born in Brooklyn, New York, of Puerto Rican descent, wore a smile at all times. I called most Mariners home games at Safeco Field, and when they went on the road, I flew south to San Francisco to call the Giants games in Spanish. I could not wait to go to Seattle to see Julio and talk baseball stories with him. I truly enjoyed every minute with Julio; he was genuine, humble, and just fun to be around. When we first started working together, he knew who I was because he was then a player with the Mariners, and I would interview him and others during batting practice before the games.

In Seattle, when Julio came up to the booth to work the games with me, I was his first broadcast partner, and I was lucky!. He was funny and inquisitive, and he loved the word “wow,” which he used frequently during our broadcast. He was the Mariners’ original second baseman from 1977 to 1983. The community in the Puget Sound area loves him. Julio Cruz passed in 2022 at age 67. During the early 2000s, we would work together.  Together with our producer, Candace Oehler, we will forever remember the one and only Cruzer.

Inside the booth, Julio was funny and very curious about stats; he kept telling me he owned the team record for stolen bases. When Ichiro tied his record and later broke it, he was sad, but at the same time happy for Ichiro, whom he kept saying in the air, “wow, este hombre es increible”  trans-  “wow, this man is incredible”.Top Base Stealer in Mariners history-  Ichiro Suzuki with 438 stolen bases for the team, ahead of Julio Cruz (290) and Harold Reynolds (228)in third place.

Julio is one of the few players I ever met who had two nicknames, “Cruzer” and “Juice”.   According to Randy Adamack, former Seattle Mariners senior vice president, the nickname “Juice” came from Cruz’s constant “extra energy,” which was palpable to those around him. His former Chicago White Sox teammate Ron Kittle echoed this, saying, “You couldn’t find a more energetic guy… always full of energy.

Those were fun years working with Julio in Seattle, during his first years in the booth, in one of my favorite areas in the country, and in a place I was familiar with from my days serving in the US Army on active duty at Ft Lewis. Seattle is one of my favorite cities, and the Mariners are an excellent organization, top to bottom, with veterans of the game like the Mariners VP of Communications, Tim Hevly.

I know Julio Cruz is up in heaven, looking down, calling me and telling me, “Wow, Amaury, what are you doing!”

Note: During those years, we broadcast the games on KBRO 1490 in Seattle/Bremerton and KNTB AM 1480 in Tacoma, which at the time was part of the Christian Salem Communications group.

About nicknames: Dennis “Oil Can” Boyd on the origins of his name: “Someone caught us in a tin shed drinking Big Momma’s whiskey out of oil cans, so my friend Pap started calling me ‘Oil Can'”.

Amaury Pi-Gonzalez – Cuban-born Pi-González is one of the pioneers of Spanish-language baseball play-by-play in America. Began as Oakland A’s Spanish-language voice in 1977 ending in 2024 (interrupted by stops with the Giants, Mariners and Angels). Voice of the Golden State Warriors from 1992 through 1998. 2010 inducted in the Bay Area Radio Hall of fame.

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