Photolog: Cuban baseball boys dreaming of Major League Baseball | Reuters

HAVANA, Aug 17, 2022 (Reuters) – Kevin Kinderan, 8, lives in Cuba and is a shortstop for the Central Havana junior league baseball team. Together with his teammate Leoni Venego (7), who guards first base, he dreams of becoming a star player.

Kinderan said he would like to play for the Cuban national team in the future. On the other hand, Venego, who is recovering from the shock of hitting out in practice the other day, is aiming even higher.

“I want to go to the big leagues and be like Yuri Gurriel,” Venego said. Yuri Gurriel is a former Cuban national team player who played first baseman for the Houston Astros of the US Major League Baseball (MLB). Cuba and the United States have long had a tense relationship.

Baseball is a Cuban national pastime and a favorite of former coach Fidel Castro. But the criteria for baseball success are shifting from domestic to international, reflecting the growing number of people fleeing the communist island nation, which is plagued by social and economic crisis.

Cuba’s economy has contracted by 11% in 2020, according to official data, before recovering only modestly. The corona crisis hit just as the U.S. embargo started during the Cold War. Long lines for food, medicine and fuel have become a familiar sight. According to US Customs and Border Protection, more than 157,000 Cubans have flowed into the United States since October 2021, near a record high.

“The number of baseball players who left Cuba has tripled in the last six years compared to the 2000s,” said Francis Romero, a Florida baseball expert and author. “With this, the domestic baseball league cannot be maintained.”

In the past, Cuban baseball has made great achievements, winning gold medals at the 1992 Barcelona Games, the 1996 Atlanta Games, and the 2004 Athens Games, as well as three gold medals.

“In the past, it was difficult to get permission to emigrate when trying to prove yourself abroad. Nowadays, people leave the country at the age of 16 or 17. Many Cuban players no longer follow the ideologies and policies of the Cuban government. ‘ says Romero.

Ponton Stadium in central Havana. The soil in the infield is muddy, and the foul line is overgrown with weeds, but young baseball players are swinging their bats and playing catch for the first time in their lives, and are practicing hard.

Current youth coach Irakli Chirino, who started playing baseball at the Ponton and became a player in the Cuban domestic league, believes that even these children are not immune to the effects of Cuba’s deep economic crisis and the temptation to emigrate. talk. “In Cuba, we don’t have gloves, bats, shoes, even balls, and even if we do, the prices are too high,” Chirino told Reuters between practices.

Due to the lack of baseball equipment, children who were once fascinated by baseball have switched to soccer, which is popular in other Latin American countries because it does not require as much equipment as baseball, or have played abroad from a young age. Cirino says he’s been dreaming about it.

“Let’s face it, the best baseball players in our country go abroad before they can make their domestic league debut,” Chirino said.

For baseball coach Nicolas Reyes, 73, it’s a bittersweet reality. More than a dozen of his students have already signed contracts in non-Cuban leagues.

“The kids who started playing baseball under my guidance are now major league players. I’m proud of them,” Reyes said.

Still, Reyes admits that the allure of wealth and fame is beginning to outstrip patriotism.

“It was different when I was active. It was impossible to abandon the country.”

Cuban Baseball Federation President Juan Reinaldo Pérez said that the continued production of excellent players, including those who left Cuba, is a beacon of hope for the future of Cuban baseball. “Cuba has a baseball tradition that continues to grow,” Perez said.

According to Perez, Cuba has limited human resources and is currently focusing on preventing the outflow of promising baseball players.

The baseball federation signed an agreement with the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC) in May that formally recognizes the right of Cubans to sign professional leagues around the world without renouncing their homeland or nationality.

In 2018, a similar agreement was signed with the U.S. Major League Baseball to give Cuban players similar rights. However, it was revoked by then-U.S. President Donald Trump before it went into effect, leaving many Cuban players with dreams of advancing to the major leagues to feel that they had no choice but to abandon the country. .

Guillermo Carmona, coach of the Cuban domestic league team Industriales, said the absence of such an agreement remains a major obstacle to preventing the outflow of talent. “It’s true that these agreements (for the players) were a great motivation,” said Carmona. “But a lot of players left the country[because it was disabled].”