The Rio Grande Valley Giants was an American minor league baseball franchise in the Double-A Texas League located in

Harlingen, Texas Harlingen ( ) is a city in Cameron County in the central region of the Rio Grande Valley of the southern part of the U.S. state of Texas, about from the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. The city covers more than and is the second-largest city in ...

, that played from the beginning of the

1960 It is also known as the "Year of Africa" because of major events—particularly the independence of seventeen African nations—that focused global attention on the continent and intensified feelings of Pan-Africanism. Events January * Ja ...

season through June 10, 1961. As its nickname implies, the team was affiliated with the San Francisco Giants. It played its home games at Harlingen Field. The Texas League underwent a massive face lift in the late 1950s after three of its top franchises — Dallas,

Fort Worth Fort Worth is the fifth-largest city in the U.S. state of Texas and the 13th-largest city in the United States. It is the county seat of Tarrant County, covering nearly into four other counties: Denton, Johnson, Parker, and Wise. According ...

and Houston — moved up to the Triple-A American Association for the

1959 Events January * January 1 - Cuba: Fulgencio Batista flees Havana when the forces of Fidel Castro advance. * January 2 - Lunar probe Luna 1 was the first man-made object to attain escape velocity from Earth. It reached the vicinity of E ...

season. The

Corpus Christi Giants Corpus is Latin for "body". It may refer to: Linguistics * Text corpus, in linguistics, a large and structured set of texts * Speech corpus, in linguistics, a large set of speech audio files * Corpus linguistics, a branch of linguistics Music * ...

, which joined the TL in

1958 Events January * January 1 – The European Economic Community (EEC) comes into being. * January 3 – The West Indies Federation is formed. * January 4 ** Edmund Hillary's Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition completes the third ...

, finished last in attendance (61,500) in 1959, and transferred to Harlingen over the winter. Harlingen had been represented in numerous lower-level minor leagues, most recently the Big State League (1954–55). In 1960, the Rio Grande Valley club won the regular-season pennant and finished third in attendance (75,000) in the six-team league. But the following season, a poor club on the field resulted in a severe attendance decline, and the Giants moved to Victoria, Texas, in mid-June. Harlingen has since had clubs in the

Gulf States League The Gulf States League was a Class A level American minor baseball league that existed for one season — — and was based in the American states of Texas and Louisiana. History Although its teams were not affiliated with any Major League Bas ...

and the Lone Star League of the 1970s and in independent leagues since 1994.

Notable alumni

Bobby Bolin Bobby Donald Bolin (born January 29, 1939) is an American former professional baseball pitcher who appeared 495 games in Major League Baseball over 13 seasons (1961–1973) for the San Francisco Giants (–), Milwaukee Brewers () and Boston ...

Chuck Hiller Charles Joseph Hiller (October 1, 1934 – October 20, 2004) was an American Major League Baseball second baseman. In the 1962 World Series, he became the first National League player to hit a grand slam in a World Series. Hiller batted left-h ...

* Manny Mota * Gaylord Perry *

José Tartabull José Milages Tartabull Guzmán (born November 27, 1938) is a Cuban former professional baseball outfielder. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) from 1962 to 1970 for the Kansas City / Oakland Athletics and Boston Red Sox. Career Tartab ...

References

*Johnson, Lloyd, and Wolff, Miles, ed., ''The Encyclopedia of Minor League Baseball,'' 1997 edition. Durham, N.C.:

Baseball America ''Baseball America'' is a sports enterprise that covers baseball at every level, including MLB, with a particular focus on up-and-coming players in the MiLB, college, high school, and international leagues. It is currently published in the form o ...

. Defunct Texas League teams San Francisco Giants minor league affiliates Defunct baseball teams in Texas Baseball teams disestablished in 1961 Baseball teams established in 1960 {{Texas-baseball-team-stub