Cristian Guzmán

Guzmán with the Washington Nationals

Shortstop

Born: March 21, 1978 (age 38)
Bani, Dominican Republic

Batted: Switch

Threw: Right

MLB debut

April 6, 1999, for the Minnesota Twins

Last MLB appearance

September 8, 2010, for the Texas Rangers

MLB statistics

Batting average

.271

Home runs

Runs batted in

467

Teams

Career highlights and awards

2× All-Star (2001, 2008)

Cristian Antonio Guzmán (born March 21, 1978) is a Dominican former professional baseball shortstop in Major League Baseball.

Guzmán was acquired by the Minnesota Twins in 1998 from the New York Yankees organization as part of the Chuck Knoblauch trade.

In 2001, Guzmán was named to the AL All-Star team and posted career bests with 10 home runs and a .302 batting average. He was a key part of the Twins teams that won three consecutive American League Central titles from 2002–2004. While a Twin, he led the American League in triples in 2000 (20), 2001 (14) and 2003 (14). His total of 20 in 2000 was only the tenth time a player had reached that number in the last 70 years.

After becoming a free agent, Guzmán signed a $16.8 million, four-year contract with the Washington Nationals for the 2005 season but then proceeded to have the worst year of his career. As the full-time shortstop, he was batting .192 at the end of August, but rallied in September, hitting .325, which helped bring his average up to .219.

Three days after the disastrous 2005 season, Guzmán had eye surgery, which he credited as a prime reason for his resurgence in the following years.

Guzmán was sidelined for the entire 2006 campaign with a shoulder injury and subsequent surgery, but returned in 2007 as the Nationals' starting shortstop following the trade of second baseman José Vidro to the Seattle Mariners and the move of Felipe López to second base. However, he injured his hamstring on the first day of the regular season. He was on the disabled list until May 7, 2007. Batting leadoff, he was hitting .329 (second on the team), and despite missing almost half of the season through late June, was third in the league with six triples. On June 24, however, Guzmán was injured while tagging out a would-be base-stealer, and had surgery the next day to repair a torn thumb ligament, sidelining him for the rest of the 2007 season.

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