According to comprehensive media reports, the U23 Baseball World Cup ended last Sunday (3rd) by defeating host Mexico 4-0 by Venezuela and winning the championship. The Cuban Caribbean Islands team, which lost to Colombia 3:5 in the third place match, missed the bronze medal. After the battle, two more players from the Cuban team left the team, bringing the total number of defectors from the team to 11 since this tournament.
According to a source close to the Caribbean Islands team, Cuba’s starter Brian Chi (Brian Chi) left the team last Saturday (9th) and became the 9th player who decided to defect; Gardener Diasmany Palacio (Diasmany Palacio), Reinaldo Lazaga (Reinaldo Lazaga); catcher Leodel Rodríguez (Liodel Rodríguez); pitcher Ubert Ubert Mejías, Luis Dany Morales, Yeinel Zayas, Dariel Fernandez and the player Miguel Antonio González (Miguel Antonio González) leaves the team.
In the end, only 13 of the 24 members returned to their communist motherland. The news went viral on the Internet in multiple languages. The Cuban National Institute of Sports also issued a statement immediately criticizing the lack of ethnic and moral awareness of this group of missing players.
Sports journalist Francys Romero said that this was “an unprecedented defection in baseball history” and broke the record for a Cuban baseball player to defect.
Observers pointed out that in Cuba, which is in deep economic crisis, the authorities’ ineffective fight against the epidemic and the suppression of civil liberties have caused dissatisfaction among the people. Although the immigration reform in 2013 allowed people to leave the country with passports and visas, the epidemic has led to fewer flights, and the possibility of “legal departure” has been greatly reduced.
Leonardo Padura, a Cuban novelist who wrote interviews with players into a book, said: “I often hear people say that the state of baseball in Cuba reflects the situation in this country.”
He said: “You have to respect the decision of these young people. This is a very complicated decision because they have to give up a lot.”
According to the report, Cuba belongs to a communist society. Of course, the size of the domestic baseball league and the major leagues cannot be compared. Therefore, players all hope to leave the country for better treatment and development. In the past, Cuban players had only two ways to defect. The first is through penetration. The Super Snake Group smuggled to other countries to obtain residency, and waited for the major league team to provide a contract before entering the United States. The second is to take advantage of participating in international competitions to go to other countries and obtain residency rights in order to sign with a major league team as a free agent. Defection from Cuba to the United States can be said to be quite dangerous. Many players also defect through human trafficking groups. On the way, they may go through the risk of kidnapping or even death threats, and they are usually taking advantage of going abroad to play in a third country. When he defected, he was unable to fly freely, usually through illegal ships arranged by the group, and through unpredictable long-distance sea journeys to reach the US-Mexico border. However, in order to realize their dreams, many Cuban players still defected to the United States despite the dangers. In recent years, more than 80 Cuban players have successfully defected.
The defection of Cuban baseball players has heated up after the disintegration of the Soviet Union; since Rene Arocha left the national team at Miami Airport in 1991 and developed his career in the United States, Cuba has had about 2 to 3 players leaving every year, even in 1996. Nine people defected.
Cuban players who left, from Livan Hernandez, Jose Abreu to Aroldis Chapman and Randy Arozarena, all played in Major League Baseball To stand out.
The defection that attracted the most public attention should be the right fielder Yasiel Puig of the Cuban team in 2012. With the assistance of 13 illegal Vietnamese and locals, he successfully entered the United States to obtain legal status and cooperated with Los Angeles. Los Angeles Dodgers signed a seven-year, $42 million contract to officially challenge the major leagues.
When the Cuban baseball team went to the United States to participate in the Tokyo Olympic qualifying game earlier this year, the general Cesar Prieto, two other players and the team’s psychologist defected; in the end, the three-time Olympic champion Cuba failed to win the Olympics. Qualification is the first time in team history.
Sports reporter Romero pointed out that the number of players seeking careers in other countries has skyrocketed. Now they are younger and not all of them are destined to become major league stars. So why take the risk? That is “(first) change their lives. Then comes sports.”
According to reports, since the outbreak of the Cuban Revolution in 1959, athletes’ escape has become a measure to seek opportunities outside of Cuba in international competitions. From Olympic athletes, football players to baseball players, all deserters seek better welfare for their families due to economic crisis, freedom restrictions, or internal suppression by their opponents.
In fact, when the diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States slowed down in 2018, the Major League had a peace agreement with Cuba, giving Cuban players a larger and stable channel. But as the relationship between the two countries deteriorated, it was suspended again.
The Cuban Baseball Association executive Luis Daniel del Risco said that the defectors “failed to fulfill their commitment to their teammates and the country”, but admitted that it was “the personal decision of each of them.”
Romero said that the team holds the passport of the players, and those who fled are not allowed to return to Cuba for 8 years. Cuban players “in order to be able to play abroad, must give up the national team, give up being a Cuban, this is not fair.” He believes that there is only one solution: “give Cuban players the same opportunities as others.”
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