Three-time Champion Cuba Out of Olympic Baseball For the First Time

(ATR) Cuba is out of the Olympic tournament for the first time since baseball officially entered the program at the 1992 Barcelona Games.

Cuba, the only three-time Olympic champion in the sport, was eliminated Tuesday night by Canada, 6-5, at Clover Park in Port St. Lucie, Florida.

"Farewell to the Olympic dream", "For the first time Cuba is left without baseball in the Olympic Games" were some of the headlines in the official Cuban press.

Their new dream will have to wait seven years, until the Los Angeles Olympics, where baseball is expected to return after its exclusion by the organizers of Paris 2024.

On the second day of the Pre-Olympic Tournament of the Americas, the United States became the first team to qualify for the Super Round with an 8-6 win over the Dominican Republic in Group A.

Cuban-American players played a key role in the victory for the Stars and Stripes. Triston Casas opened the local scoring with a two-run double in the first inning.

Casas (two hits, two RBI, one run scored) and the other Cuban-American born in Miami, Eddy Alvarez (two doubles, two runs) led the hitting for Team USA.

EDDY ALVAREZ HISTORY

In 2020 Eddy Alvarez became the first Winter Games Olympian to be a Major League Baseball player and today he could add another historic page if the United States qualifies for the Olympic baseball tournament in Tokyo.

And that goal could be achieved if the U.S. gets the only ticket in this Tournament of the Americas that concludes on June 5. The second and third place teams would advance to the World Qualifier in Mexico on June 22, along with Chinese Taipei, Netherlands and Australia.

Alvarez, the son of Cuban émigrés, played with the Miami Marlins last MLB season, six years after winning a silver medal in speed skating at the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.

He could now be headed to the Summer Olympics as a baseball player.

Alvarez is also the second Olympic medalist in a sport other than baseball to make it to the Majors, after Jim Thorpe (Michael Jordan tried with the Chicago White Sox to play minor league baseball in 1994 but gave up and returned to the Chicago Bulls in 1995).

DISAPPOINTMENT AMONG CUBANS

The U.S., Canada, Dominican Republic and Venezuela have already qualified for the second round of the Olympic qualifiers in Palm Beach and St. Lucie counties, the first baseball tournament organized by the World Baseball Confederation (WBSC) in more than a year because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Covid-19 forced the suspension of the continental event twice at its initial venue, Arizona, in 2020.

The Pre-Olympics of the Americas was in limbo just a short time before the opening of the Olympic Games when the possibility of Florida appeared.

From a country marked by insecurity for the celebration of a sporting spectacle, and the first with contagions and deaths in the world, the United States became a year later the place with the best conditions to organize it due to the impressive national vaccination campaign.

As far as can be remembered, never before would Cuba's main national baseball team have competed in Florida in 60 years, so close to Miami, considered "the capital of Cuban exile". In the summer of 2018 in Viera, Florida, nearly 190 miles from Miami, Cuba participated in a Women's World Cup.

There were initially problems with visas for the Cuban delegation, until they were resolved, in Havana, six days before the start of the event and the Cuban Federation thanked the WBSC for helping to clear up the problem. But this Monday it sent a formal note of protest to the WBSC itself following the game against Venezuela in Palm Beach, which the Cubans lost 6-5.

In the middle of the game, a young woman came onto the field with a banner against the Cuban regime and the game was interrupted for a few minutes. At that moment and throughout the game, many spectators, clearly of Cuban origin, shouted against the Government of Havana while cheering the players, a situation that was repeated in the stands with numerous Cuban flags in the second game against Canada.

These scenes were seen in Cuba through broadcasts of the games provided by the WBSC.

The Cuban Federation considered that these demonstrations were hurting the concentration of the Cuban team and warned that the carrying of signs and verbal offenses were "inadmissible actions that we are not willing to deal with".

WBSC STATEMENT

Asked by Around The Rings about the FCB protest, WBSC sent this statement:

"The WBSC acknowledged the letter from the Cuba Baseball Federation, which included their concerns regarding fans who were politically protesting during their game against Venezuela. The Local Organizing Committee resolved the situation by improving security and increasing the number of support staff and the WBSC assured the Cuba Baseball Federation that the safety of their players will continue to be of the highest priority.

"Whilst we respect people’s right to free speech it’s disappointing that some people choose to distract from what is an excellent sporting event, the first WBSC baseball tournament in over a year, offering a ticket to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. The vast majority of baseball fans have been focused purely on the outstanding sporting action on the field where we have had thrilling games, full of drama and great plays. We are looking forward to more exciting games over the next days to see who claims the ticket to Tokyo."

A few hours after arriving in Miami from Havana, Cuba suffered the defection of its top prospect, César Prieto, whose whereabouts are unknown and who has not yet made any public statements.

A marked unease among Cuban sports fans has been caused by the early elimination of its national baseball team, the island's national sport, after successive failures in recent major international tournaments such as the Pan American Games in Lima and the WBSC Premier 12 Tournament, both in 2019.

Cuba won gold medals in Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1996 and Athens 2004. The exodus of numerous stars to the United States has taken its toll on its traditional international strength. The Cuban authorities have stopped accusing the Major Leagues as a "thief" of its talent and instead signed a working agreement with MLB, which was put on hold by then-President Donald Trump. They are waiting for President Joe Biden to approve it.

Written and Reported by Miguel Hernandez

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