President Barack Obama’s last day of his historic recent visit to Cuba included a baseball game between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Cuban National Team. America’s national pastime is also Cuba’s national sport, and Major League Baseball is very interested in Cuban talent. In fact, a recent change in federal policy will make it much easier for MLB to sign Cuban players. Where it might lead is of great interest to University of Illinois historian Adrian Burgos Jr., the author of “Playing America's Game: Baseball, Latinos, and the Color Line” and “Cuban Star,” about an Afro-Cuban-American who largely led the way for Latino players in the U.S. Burgos and his research will be the subject of a Big Ten Network documentary scheduled for later this spring. He also served as a consultant for Ken Burns’ documentary on Jackie Robinson airing on PBS stations April 11-12. Burgos spoke with News Bureau social sciences editor Craig Chamberlain.
For those who don’t follow baseball closely, what makes Cuba such a hotbed of baseball talent?
Cuba is a hotbed of talent due to its well-established system of talent development. Talented players are identified at an early age and enrolled in sports academies run by the National Institute of Sport and Recreation. In those academies, they spend half their days attending classes and the other half receiving training and instruction in their chosen sport.
The very best players are named to national teams and travel extensively to participate in national and international tournaments. The elite ultimately earn a spot in Cuba’s national league while continuing to play in international tournaments such as the MLB’s World Baseball Classic. Performance in Cuba’s national league and in international competition is what draws the interests of major league scouts, since Cubans’ extensive playing experience makes them rather fully developed major league talents.
How does this recent change in U.S. policy alter things for Cuban baseball prospects?
The amendments enacted by the U.S. Department of Treasury allow for direct payment to Cuban citizens for their professional employment in the U.S., clearing the way for MLB franchises to directly pay Cuban players.
Before this, the path to the majors required defection from Cuba. Defectors typically opted to establish residency in a country with easy residency requirements, usually in Central America. They did so because, if they defected directly to the U.S., they would wait longer to establish legal residency and would be subject to the major leagues’ annual amateur draft. As a resident of a third country, a Cuban more quickly became available to sign as an international amateur free agent, which usually spurred a bidding war between major league organizations. So a potential downside of the new rule change could be a lowering of signing bonuses as Cuban players become more available to major league organizations.
But equally significant, the rule changes could facilitate the end of the human trafficking of aspiring Cuban players. Over the last several years, narcotraffickers with financial resources, high-speed boats and nautical knowledge have become increasingly involved in smuggling players out of Cuba. Press attention to their involvement, including in the case of Los Angeles Dodger Yasiel Puig, illuminated how defectors are basically held captive while a contract is negotiated with a major league organization and the smugglers’ percentage of future earnings set. The cases reveal how MLB’s intense desire for Cuban baseball talent combined with the U.S. trade embargo to incentivize human trafficking.
What’s at risk for Cuba or its baseball system in a relationship with Major League Baseball? What potential changes do you think Cuba would be wise to resist?
Cubans truly enjoy witnessing native sons Puig, José Abreu, Yoenis Cespedes and Aroldis Chapman succeed in the majors. However, the current moment is filled with apprehension about the future of Cuban baseball. They wonder whether MLB will truly partner with them in ushering in a new era or will act in an imperial manner – creating a system that allows them to extract top talent while dismantling the very talent-development infrastructure that produced the desired players. In essence, they are concerned about MLB attempting to replicate the baseball academy system they created in the Dominican Republic.
The impact that such a change can have on Cuban baseball is stark. Based on Major League Baseball International rules, Dominicans are eligible to be signed as amateur free agents when they turn 16. This has contributed to Dominican boys dropping out of school as young as ten years old to dedicate themselves to baseball and a chance at signing with a major league organization. Another potential impact Cubans dread is MLB academies supplanting the Cuban academies, which also serve as the training ground for coaches, team managers and athletic trainers. Supplanting Cuba’s baseball infrastructure thus affects more than those on the playing field.
Finally, the Cuban Baseball Federation desires compensation for its work developing the baseball players MLB so desires. The Cuban government covers all the costs of training and developing baseball players – it is socialist baseball. This is the exact opposite of how baseball talent is developed in the U.S., where the pay-to-play system and the dominance of travel baseball in the amateur ranks has made it a middle-class sport. Plainly put, the Cuban state pays for everything for an aspiring player’s development while in the U.S. it is principally upon the parents to cover the investment – which often exceeds $100,000 by the time a player either enters college or is drafted. That, too, is a system that Cubans hope to avoid having imported to their land.