{"id":7764,"date":"2014-05-16T09:59:33","date_gmt":"2014-05-16T13:59:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/?p=7764"},"modified":"2014-05-16T10:03:44","modified_gmt":"2014-05-16T14:03:44","slug":"former-big-leaguer-julio-franco-to-play-for-independent-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/2014\/05\/16\/former-big-leaguer-julio-franco-to-play-for-independent-team\/","title":{"rendered":"Julio Franco, 55, to play for Independent team"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/files\/2014\/05\/juliofranco.jpg\" alt=\"juliofranco\" width=\"500\" height=\"350\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-7765\" srcset=\"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/files\/2014\/05\/juliofranco.jpg 500w, http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/files\/2014\/05\/juliofranco-300x210.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><br \/>\nJulio Franco is not ready to retire just yet. The former major leaguer last played at the big league level in 2007 as a 48-year-old. Now 55, Franco has signed on with the Fort Worth Cats for a manager\/player role.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m very excited about the opportunity to play and coach in Fort Worth and reconnect with my friends, former teammates and Texas Rangers staff members,\u201d said Franco in a team released <a href=\"http:\/\/fwcats.com\/news\/?article_id=292\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">statement<\/a>. \u201cI love Fort Worth and I\u2019m very excited about the opportunity to work with the younger players and entertain the fans.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/aFK68PDe5uU\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>In 23 seasons at the big league level Franco played for eight different teams compiling a .298\/.365\/.417 line with 173 home runs and 1194 RBI.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m excited to have Julio as both a hitting coach and player,\u201d Mike Marshall, current Cats\u2019 manager said. \u201cOur players and fans are very lucky to get this opportunity and I\u2019m sure Julio will make an immediate impact on the players and the community.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Julio Franco is not ready to retire just yet. The former major leaguer last played at the big league level in 2007 as a 48-year-old. Now 55, Franco has signed on with the Fort Worth Cats for a manager\/player role. \u201cI\u2019m very excited about the opportunity to play and coach in Fort Worth and reconnect [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7765,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[499],"tags":[747,501],"coauthors":[6],"class_list":{"0":"post-7764","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-julio-franco","9":"tag-mlb"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7764"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7764\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7770,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7764\/revisions\/7770"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7764"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=7764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}