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In William Strunk's Elements of Style, it is recommended that commas shouldn't be used after coordinating conjunctions that are followed by parenthetical elements:

The Red Sox were leading the league at the end of May, but of course, they always do well in the spring. (no comma after but)

Does this recommendation holds for Spanish? For example, is the following sentence incorrect?

Universidad Católica fue puntero toda la liga, pero, por supuesto, salieron segundos.

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  • The reason I dislike many style guides is they don't make much sense. In English, there's a clear difference between "..., but of course, ..." and "..., but, of course, ..." (the extra pause means that, in American English, for instance, the t in but will be voiceless and aspirated, whereas without, it turns into a voiced alveolar flap). In general, Spanish makes much less use of commas than English.
    – user0721090601
    Commented Jun 10, 2015 at 15:18
  • Does this phonetic difference translates into a semantic difference? Since this recommendation holds just for written English I don't see the problem.
    – Federico
    Commented Jun 10, 2015 at 18:00

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In this case, there are two rules to combine:

  • Always write a comma before an adversative conjunction (such as pero)
  • All constructions meaning of course (such as por supuesto, naturalmente, desde luego...) must be surrounded by commas

You put these two norms together and get the correct punctuation, which is the one you write in your question:

Universidad Católica fue puntero toda la liga, pero, por supuesto, salieron segundos.

There is a concordance error in this sentence, but that's a different thing.

Ommitting the commas can lead to a different meaning in some sentences using these elements. For instance:

El gato es, naturalmente, un carnívoro, pero puede subsistir con una dieta omnívora.

This means: The cat is, of course, a carnivore, but it can subsist on an omnivorous diet.

On the other hand:

El gato es naturalmente un carnívoro, pero puede subsistir con una dieta omnívora.

This means: The cat is a carnivore by nature, but it can subsist on an omnivorous diet.

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  • By a concordance error you mean: "Universidad Católica fue puntero"? That would be the case if you were talking about the university ("la universidad"), but it refers to a soccer team ("el equipo"), so it is actually masculine.
    – Federico
    Commented Jun 11, 2015 at 13:29
  • I mean that, for the same subject (Universidad Católica), they use first a singular verb (fue) and then a plural (salieron). It can be one or the other, but not both. In fact, in correct Spanish, collective names should use the singular, so salieron is incorrect.
    – Gorpik
    Commented Jun 12, 2015 at 7:17

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