International Play

These are among the most high profile competitions outside of Major League Baseball and Cuba’s achievements have been unmatched by any other nation.

Since the World Cup began in England in 1938, Cuba has won 25 of the 29 competitions it has competed in (there have been 36 competitions including the 2005 World Cup in Holland). Cuba has also played host to the world championships 11 times.

The Cuban national team has captured 10 Pan-American Games baseball titles, including the last 9 in a row. It defeated the U.S. in the final game in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic in August of 2003 to take the gold. 

In Intercontinental Cup play, Cuba has won 19 competitions, the latest of which was held in Cuba, in September of 2002, where it defeated South Korea in an exciting 2-1 final.


Although international baseball appeared in exhibition form as early as the 1904 Olympic Games in St. Louis, it took until 1992 for baseball to be recognized as a medal sport, after being seen as a demonstration sport at the Seoul Olympics of 1988 and the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, where Cuba did not compete. At the 1992 Olympic Games, in Barcelona, Cuba defeated Taiwan 11-1 to win the gold medal.

At the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, Cuba defeated Japan in the final game by a 12-9 margin. Then, at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, a brilliant pitching performance by Team U.S.A.’s Ben Sheets shut down Team Cuba, as a jubilant American team upset the defending champs 4-0 to take the gold.

These international baseball competitions are regulated by the International Baseball Federation (IBAF), which has undergone several incarnations since its foundation in 1938. In 1996 its predecessor version, the International Baseball Association, ruled that professional athletes would be allowed into the international competitions. By 1998, Major League Baseball agreed to permit athletes from its affiliate organizations, up to Triple AAA, to compete for Team USA and other nations.

The year 2003 saw Team Cuba compete in two major competitions. In October, Cuba played host to the XXV World Cup of baseball, where 15 nations were present. Team Cuba was undefeated in the tournament, defeating Panama 4-2 in the final. Pitcher Norge Luis Vera relieved Camaguey’s Vicyohandry Odelin to shut down the rivals.

A short time later, Team Cuba traveled to Panama to compete in the Americas Olympic qualifier event. Cuba qualified for the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens when it defeated Puerto Rico 10-0 in the semifinal. Then it defeated Canada 5-0 in the final game to win the tournament. Adiel Palma gave up only two hits in eight innings with 11 strikeouts. Joan Carlos Pedroso hit a two-run homer in the seventh. Eriel Sanchez knocked in a run in the eighth, followed by a two-run triple by Ariel Pestano.

In August of 2004, following the elimination of Canada in an exciting semi-final (8-5), Team Cuba recaptured Olympic gold in Athens by defeating a determined Australian squad by a 6-2 score. Adiel Palma got the win, as the Cubans produced 13 hits. Cuba’s runs were scored on a two-run homer by left fielder Frederich Cepeda, a two-run double by shortstop Eduardo Paret and a two RBI single by DH Eriel Sanchez.

It was a bittersweet victory for Team Cuba, which waited four long years to recoup the title. Unfortunately they could not avenge their 2000 Olympics loss against Team USA, as that nation did not qualify for the baseball competition in Athens.

In September of 2005 defended its crown at the 36th World Cup in Holland, with a 3-0 win over South Korea. Danny Betacourt and Pedro Luis Lazo combined for the shutout victory. The Cubans blanked Panama 15-2 in the semi-finals.

Outstanding performance were given by Eduardo Paret, who was voted the World Cup’s MVP, hitting .632, with 8 stolen bases in the round robin, before a knee injury put him out of the tournament.

Pedro Luis Lazo threw an amazing ERA of 0.54 in 17 relief innings, while veteran lefty Adiel Palma was 2-0 with 21 strikeouts. 

Designated hitter Michel Enriquez knocked in 20 RBI with a .500 average in 46 at-bats while third baseman Yulieski Gourriel, a player many regard as Team Cuba’s brightest prospect, whacked 8 home runs, while turning in outstanding defensive performances.


BASEBALL REJECTED FROM OLYMPICS

In July of 2005 the International Olympic Committee surprised baseball fans around the world when it announced that baseball (and women’s softball) would be dropped from the 2012 Olympics – the first sport to be dropped from the games since 1936. And, despite an appeal in February of 2006, the IOC voted to reject reinstatement of baseball to the games.

IOC President Jaques Rogge said that international baseball’s continued refusal to allow its best to compete in the games, along with its refusal to meet Olympic-grade World Anti Doping Agency standards, were contributing factors to the ousting of baseball as an Olympic event. “The IOC wants clean sport, the best athletes and universality,” said Rogge.

Unlike the National Basketball Association, or the National Hockey League – the latter of which interupted its regular season for the 1998, 2002 and 2006 Winter Games – MLB won’t permit its athletes to participate in Olympic competition. 

Carlos Rodriguez, the Cuban Baseball Federation’s president also echoed the IOC leader’s sentiments. “Those who bear most of the blame are the owners of the professional leagues who refuse to free up their baseball players to compete,” he told the Associated Press, when baseball was initially rejected.

For Cuba and other baseball-loving nations – especially those with amateur leagues – the elimination of baseball from Olympic competition is a very contentious matter. Many countries’ federations, including Cuba’s, gear player and roster development around the four-year Olympic cycle.

Cuba is fully supportive and competes in IBAF-sponsored competitions. The IBAF represents 113 baseball federations around the world.

WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC

Three days after baseball was dropped from the Olympics in July of 2005, MLB and the Major League Players Association announced a preliminary schedule for a “Word Baseball Classic” (WBC) to be held in March of 2006, during spring training.

With a co-sanctioning from the International Baseball Federation, World Anti-Doping Agency rules are to be adhered to by MLB and baseball federations of competing countries.

And while MLB’s commissioner Selig has stated the “World Baseball Classic” will internationalize the sport “in a very dramatic way,” Cuba’s Baseball Commissioner, Carlos Rodriguez, said, in July of 2005, that such an event should be not be managed by MLB. He said that MLB is profit-driven and has not shown past interest in developing the discipline of baseball internationally.

The inaugaral “World Baseball Classic” is designed to be an international MLB marketing extravaganza, with major league and other professional athletes from 16 nations in competition. The 18-day event will be played in Puerto Rico, Japan and the United States (Orlando, Phoenix and San Diego), between March 8 – 20. 

After Cuba’s participation was initially rejected by the U.S. Treasury Department in December, 2005, Latin American countries, including Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and Venezuela, threatened to boycott the event. And rather than seek monetary compensation for participation in the WBC, which is prohibited by U.S. trade sanctions, the Cuban Baseball Federation offered that its share of proceeds from the event be given to victims of Hurricane Katrina. 

After the IBAF threatened to withdraw its approval of the entire WBC, thereby scuttling the event, tournament organizers (with Cuba’s cooperation) and the U.S. Treasury Department were able to settle on an arrangement that would allow Team Cuba to participate.

As USA Today columnist Hal Bodley noted: “Having a world baseball tournament without Cuba is like putting on a major league season without the New York Yankees.”

Other nations competing in the event are the United States, Canada, Mexico, South Africa, Japan, Chinese Tapei, South Korea, the People’s Republic of China, the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Australia and Italy.

Teams are allowed a roster of 30 players, with a minimum of 13 pitchers – each to be limited to 65, 80 and 95 pitches in the first, second and third rounds of the tournament. 

Cuban defectors playing big league and professional baseball will not compete for Team Cuba. At one point when Cuba’s participation seemed unsure, MLB may have invited alternate nations to compete or included a team of Cuban expatriates in the WBC.

The Cuban Baseball Federation suspended its 45 Serie Nacional, two-thirds of the way through the season, to prepare its players for the WBC.