MLB and the communist in Cuba reached a deal that would allow their citizens to sign contracts and play in the majors for a fee to the communist. Doing business with the very same people who in 60 years haven't bothered painting their own capital.
Don't look to Russia or China hurting our country we have American citizens to thank for that.
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This isn’t a political site pal, and teams “own” players like chatttle all over the world. Get over it
The next thing you know someone will have a problem with players from Massachusetts because it’s a blue state.
MLB doesn’t give a damn about Cuba. MLB cares about the baseball talent in Cuba.
What happened to Puig should not happen to anyone, even a Dodger, so this sounds like a good idea to me.
How does it hurt America?
I have always wanted to visit Cuba.
Anybody ever see the documentary where "Spaceman" Bill Lee goes to Cuba with a barnstorming team of senior players? He visits all the locals and plays baseball with them on their dirt-patch fields. He says in Cuba "They play baseball for all the right reasons".
The Cuba embargo is still active. This is probably not legal and will likely not be allowed to happen.
RJM posted:The next thing you know someone will have a problem with players from Massachusetts because it’s a blue state.
MLB doesn’t give a damn about Cuba. MLB cares about the baseball talent in Cuba.
Yes damn mlb and the communist who took a first world country and turned into a giant cesspool.
When was Cuba a first world country? They went from a progressive democracy to authoritarian democracy to communism. The Revolution occurred because the democratic leadership (Bautista) was so corrupt.
Since when does the US not do business with crummy leaders? Hell some would argue Uncle Joe Stalin was in fact the worst human being that ever lived. He generally gets a pass in history because he lived in the time of the only other contender for the title - and won the war in no small part because the US was on his side.
Could go on - Iran, Vietnam, Chile and Argentina just to name a few others.
As for Cuba itself, like many other places in the Caribbean it has been totally corrupt and mismanaged for centuries. Even the US can't get Puerto Rico right after 125 years. Among other problems there the lights don't even work there the way they should. Central America isn't much better either.
But there is no doubt about this - Cuba like Japan took to baseball from the occupying US military as well as anywhere we have gone.
I can understand florida state fan assuming he is a cuban american who has suffered from the regime but overall I think it is good to find a solution that doesn't involve trafficking.
To be serious about the transaction for a minute - this has the whiff of the Russians allowing hockey players to go to the NHL in the '80s just before the wall came down. It was a money grab by a dying government.
Let's hope it is the same here. They are trying to rewrite their constitution but still a one party set up and they have the police and military - for now. They need cash,,,US cash and this is one area they can try to pry some loose. But like anything of this nature, once doors open they can be very hard to shut again. Trickles sometimes turn into floods.
luv baseball posted:
But there is no doubt about this - Cuba like Japan took to baseball from the occupying US military as well as anywhere we have gone.
I don't think the U.S. military was a factor introducing the sport into either Cuba or Japan:
I think I'll stick with the premise of my claim - but will expand for better accuracy.
It is an overstatement to talk about "occupation" of Japan and Cuba there is no doubt in those two countries the US Navy had a major impact in exposing them to the culture of the US. We still have bases in both places. For 100 years until the 1950's US Military and related personnel were usually the primary exposure to the US culture around the world. After the Civil War - where they went baseball went with them. The roots of the game in Japan in Cuba are based on students in those country's being exposed to the game and having it coupled with US Military or Former Military personnel on the ground interacting with locals to create momentum.
From the wiki pages attached:
Baseball was introduced to Cuba in the 1860s by Cuban students returning from colleges in the United States and American sailors who ported in the country. The sport spread quickly across the island nation after its introduction, with student Nemesio Guillot receiving popular credit date for the game's growth in the mid-19th century.
Baseball was first introduced to Japan as a school sport in 1872 by American Horace Wilson,[3] an English professor at the Kaisei Academy in Tokyo. The first organized adult baseball team, called the Shimbashi Athletic Club, was established in 1878.
Horace Wilson was born in Gorham, Maine.[1] A veteran of the U.S. Civil War, where he fought for the 12th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment against the Confederates in Louisiana.
After the war, he was hired by the Japanese government as a foreign adviser to assist in the modernization of the Japanese education system after the Meiji Restoration. He served as a professor of English at Kaisei Gakko, the forerunner of Tokyo Imperial University.[2
