4/29/2011-Team Preview Las Cruces Vaqueros- 2011 will mark the 2nd year the city of Las Cruces will host the a professional team in Apodoca Park. The City of Las Cruces has been hit especially hard by economic times but the support of the community for the Vaqueros remains.
Large Changes for the Vaqueros include the following
  • Miguel Gomez, Jeff Banegas and Effrain Lada will serve as Vaqueros coaches for the 2011 season. Gone is coaches Bobby Brown/Sean Kramer-Bobby will return to Alaska, Sean is pitching coach for San Angelo.
  • Gone are the powder blue pants. The team will wear white pants exclusively.
  • Gone is the Continental Baseball League, the team now plays in the New Mexico based Pecos League. The Continental League will always be the league that finally brought baseball to Las Cruces, but in the end it was very unstable with two travel teams and basically Las Cruces and Alpine knowing it was a two team league.
  • Gone are the majority of players from 2010 season, the Vaqueros better players were picked up by higher leagues throughout the course of 2010 season. Brandon Kelly, Mitch Saum and Steve Detweiller are the only three Vaqueros coming to camp off of the 2010 team. Coach Gomez and the Vaqueros staff did not want to be saddled with prior committments to players from 2010 season. So the Vaqueros have signed a very good team for 2011 season with new players.
  • Gone are the Desert Valley Mountain Lions and Coastal Kingfish- in are the White Sands Pupfish, Roswell Invaders and Ruidoso Osos.
  • Gone is the El Paso Based General management staff from 2010 season. After receiving numerous complaints from fans, city leaders and the community the Vaqueros listened. The Vaqueros local management staff will be 100% Las Cruces Based and much more receptive to interaction with local businesses. The Continental League/El Paso based staff did not represent the Vaqueros properly in the Las Cruces Market with team operations or with promotions. The new Las Cruces Staff led by Claudia Castillo, Jeff Banegas, and Alyssa Gintant is much more professional, responsive and accessible than the 2010 staff.
  • Gone is the famed grandstand at Apodoca Park, deemed structurally unsound by structural engineers in August the City of Las Cruces has hustled and got things together in time for the start of the Vaqueros season, despite major shortages financially in City of Las Cruces Budget
Vaqueros open the 2011 in Cohen Stadium vs the Diablos May 8th and May 11th vs the White Sands Pupfish.