In September 2025, the Sultanes de Monterrey fired Roberto Kelly with a contract still in place — he was in year three of a five-year deal — after six seasons running the club. Exactly one year later, Kelly walked back into Walmart Park, this time in a Toros de Tijuana uniform, won Game 5 by a score of 10-1, and sent the Sultanes home. Tijuana is the 2026 LMB North Zone champion and is headed to the Serie del Rey.
The Firing That Made This Story
Kelly wasn’t just passing through Monterrey. He managed the Sultanes in two stints (2018–2019 and 2022–2025), won four North Zone titles and one LMB championship — the 2018 crown — and was, by any measure, the architect of that organization’s modern era. Then they cut him loose mid-contract.
Less than a month later, on October 1, 2025, the Toros de Tijuana announced him as their new manager. Nobody knew Monterrey’s habits, tendencies, and signals better than the man who built them. In a playoff series, that kind of inside knowledge doesn’t show up in any box score — but it shows up in results.
A Series Tijuana Dominated From Wire to Wire
This wasn’t a lucky run. Tijuana controlled the series from the jump:
- Game 1: Tijuana wins 2-0
- Game 2: Sultanes shut them out, 4-0
- Game 3: Tijuana rallies in extra innings, 6-5 in 11 frames — in front of 22,078 fans at Walmart Park
- Game 4: Tijuana rolls, 15-7
- Game 5: Tijuana closes it out, 10-1
Starter Adonis Medina was the key piece in the clincher. But the offensive signature of the series belonged to Hernán Pérez, who hit grand slams in consecutive games — Games 4 and 5 — both in the closing stretch of the series. That’s not a typo. Back-to-back bases-loaded home runs to slam the door on a playoff opponent. Franchy Cordero also contributed throughout the postseason.
One more number that captures where this team is right now: Tijuana won eight consecutive road games during the 2026 LMB playoffs. Winning on the road in October is hard. Reeling off eight straight away from home is something else entirely.
Kelly, the Serie del Rey, and What Comes Next
During the series, Kelly was asked about his team’s lack of home runs. His answer was telling: according to Sports Illustrated México, he said it simply didn’t concern him. Pitching and manufacturing runs through other means was enough. The numbers backed him up completely.
Tijuana’s two previous LMB championships came in 2017 and 2021. A third is now within reach. The Serie del Rey begins September 8, 2026, against the South Zone winner — either the Pericos de Puebla or the Olmecas de Tabasco.
Kelly arrives at that final having done exactly what few expected when Tijuana hired him: he learned the Sultanes from the inside, and then he used that knowledge to take them apart. The old saying covers it better than any breakdown could — nobody knew what they had.
