Do you know who José Rafael Machado is? Most likely, the answer is no. Well, this person is the same as Juan Vené, the highest ranking Venezuelan journalist in Major League baseball who for more than 60 years has dedicated himself to study, write books, narrate and comment games and cover all activities of the ball most important in the world.
I met his "double personality" when one day in the 70s he invited me to accompany him to the port of La Guaira, near the city of Caracas, where he had a surprise for me. Being in full seaport was heard through the speakers ... "Mr. José Rafael Machado is requested in the administration office." Immediately, he told me to wait for him in the corridors while answering the call. On his return we continued the journey to the VIP room where the surprise was.
During that time, he told me that in the 1950s it was the custom that sports journalists would use pseudonyms to write a column. Then he decided to put the name of Juan and the surname Vené. Why?. The name was taken by Juan Bimba the mascot of Acción Democrática, the main Venezuelan political party of the time, whose representative, Carlos Andrés Pérez, was the country's president. The surname came from the diminutive of Venezuela.
Answered the question, we go to the final destination. At the door of the room destined to lodge personalities we expected the qualified Venezuelan baseball player David Concepción with his colleagues Pete Rose, Johnny Bench and Tany Perez, members of the Reds of Cincinnati called the "Red Machinery" that had won the Series World of 1975.
After the greeting of law Juan Vené looked at me and said ... "Here they are, become famous". I made an extensive interview with these renowned players who were on a cruise in the Caribbean and took advantage of the fact that the boat made a technical touch on Venezuelan soil to greet its Captain, David Concepción. After completing the journalistic work and thanking Juan Vené, we returned to Caracas and went to the newspaper El Mundo where I wrote a wide-ranging work on the subject in question that awarded me the prize for Best Work of the Year.
In addition, I achieved something very important for a journalist, give a scoop or as it is told in journalistic slang, a tubazo. Says the saying that, "The one that comes to a good tree, good shade shelters it" ... That I can affirm with certainty ...
