The Cuba Embargo and MLB

Dara Lind has a fascinating piece at Vox about Major League Baseball, Cuba, and human smuggling, which has gained a lot of attention because of Yasiel Puig's harrowing experience. U.S. immigration law and MLB draft policy have established very particular incentives:

A Cuban player can't negotiate a contract with a major-league team while he's in Cuba, thanks to the embargo — and the Cuban government's tendency to imprison anyone who's a threat to defect. But that doesn't mean he's not allowed to negotiate a contract with a major-league team somewhere else. 

The MLB says that a player who's established residency in a third country (most often Mexico or the Dominican Republic) is allowed to negotiate with any major league team. So instead of working out a contract with only one team, like players who go directly to the US do, a player in a third country is able to put all 30 major-league teams in a bidding war against each other.

So you get out of Cuba, but then get smuggled to another Latin American country to negotiate your MLB contract. The smugglers are increasingly tied to Mexican Drug Trafficking Organizations. Once an MLB team finally signs the player, they're directly or indirectly paying criminals.

As it turns out, the problem has a simple solution:

If the US government lifted its embargo with Cuba entirely, it would solve the problem — major league teams would be allowed to sign players who were living in Cuba, thus allowing them to come to the US with a job (and a visa) in hand. That doesn't seem likely to happen anytime soon.

Simple in logic, that is, not politically. But perhaps there is even a way to achieve it within the context of the embargo:

But Rodriques of the Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime thinks that the US government could actually create a limited exception to the embargo that would apply solely to athletes. It made an exception in the 1980s for artistic and literary materials, so it's not totally unprecedented. If the US did that, it would eliminate the need for the "special license," so it would make the process for Cuban players much more straightforward — and safer.

She doesn't expand on that but I assume she means MLB teams could negotiate directly with players while they're on Cuba. But how would that work unless the Cuban government gave permission (and presumably took its own cut?).

Padres Beat the Braves

Every so often I sneak in a baseball post--yesterday I went to the Padres-Braves game with family and had a great time. We were way up in the upper deck but at least behind home plate.














It was initially an odd experience because it was raining while we drove to Petco Park, and was still humid when we got there. That's normal for Charlotte in August but utterly bizarre for San Diego. Fortunately it never started raining again. The game was a pitching duel but also long, particularly after the 7th inning (eventually the Padres won in the 12th inning from a walk off single by Will Venable).

In general, Petco is a great place to watch baseball. An added bonus for my son is that he got to watch a steady stream of planes going by downtown on their way to land. Meanwhile, I feel very confident that my older daugher will be the only kid--indeed the only person at all--in Charlotte with a Jedd Gyorko jersey. She likes how his name sounds...

Odrisamer Despaigne and Cuban Players

VM Nate has an article in Padres Public about Odrisamer Despaigne, a Cuban defector who pitched for the Padres last night (and is an interesting addition to what otherwise has been a miserable team). He absolutely shined with seven shutout innings. It got me thinking about Cuban baseball in general.

The Cuban baseball market is a terrible mess. The players defect in ways that sometimes can be dangerous (at least it seems not to have been that way for Despaigne, who defected in Spain). Since the embargo prohibits teams from signing Cubans directly, they have to defect. Although the Cuban government has allowed for direct contracts as long as they are temporary (I am not sure how that is enforced but it means they have to play for the Cuban national team when needed) they can't just sign directly with U.S. teams.

So you get stories like Yasiel Puig's, which is so dark (and made me like him more). Meanwhile, fat contracts to a fortunate few entice more Cubans to do what they can to get here. Things have not changed much from when I reviewed the book The Duke of Havana almost eight years ago. If anything, human smuggling is even more violent.

Plus, what that book showed were the players that didn't cut the mustard. For every Yasiel Puig there are plenty of others struggling in obscurity, going into debt and facing all kinds of problems in their failed attempt to make the MLB.

One of the interesting insights from the book Raceball is that Mexico doesn't suffer this same fate because from an old agreement MLB teams must pay Mexican teams when they poach a player (Japan has a similar system dating back to 1967). That's really the only way you can stop the human smuggling. This solution is currently impossible for Cuba because the embargo prohibits it--in any case the money would end up directly in the government's hands since unlike elsewhere it owns all teams. I also can't see why MLB would agree to such an arrangement again. The Japan and Mexico deals were struck long before players made tons of money.

I wish MLB would make a formal statement on Cuban defectors. When pushed Bud Selig defers:

"You’re getting into an international political situation," he said. "Commissioners have a lot of power but they don’t have an international power. It [Yasiel Puig's story] was a tough story to read." 

Selig said that there have been internal discussions about trying to do something on the issue but "it gets into a level that is really beyond us."

Well, yes, only Congress can change the law. But he could say that this is a tragedy unfolding with lots of suffering involved and that the players would be much better off with a negotiated solution. But he won't say much beyond platitudes and neither will the player's union. You can be sure the owners won't. Because this is immensely profitable. The losers don't matter to MLB but the money and the exciting stars do.

Tony Gwynn Has Died

Tony Gwynn died today after several years of treating cancer of the salivary glands (which he believes he got from chewing tobacco). This is just awful. He was only 54 years old. As a big Padres fan, Tony was a major part of my childhood. I was 14 years old when he helped take the team to the World Series. He played at San Diego State (then returned there to coach) and played his Hall of Fame entire career with the Padres, so was truly a San Diego phenomenon. Even more importantly, he was universally known as a nice person. As a kid, I had the opportunity to chat very quickly with him a few times while getting his autograph and he couldn't have been more friendly (as was also the case with Jerry Coleman, who also died this year). And just look at these statistics. Only 434 strikeouts in his entire career alongside 3,141 hits. One of the eternal "what ifs" debated among Padres fans is whether he could've batted .400 in 1994 if the strike hadn't ended the season.

I've written before about how I have an autographed print on my office. With Tony Gwynn there really isn't hagiography. He was a great baseball player and a great person.

What terrible news. What a horrible year for the team. On and off the field.

Update: The Padres issued a statement, which includes this. Very true.

There are no words to express what Tony means to this organization and this community. More than just Mr. Padre, Tony was Mr. San Diego. He cared deeply about our city and had a profound impact on our community. He forever will be remembered not only for his tremendous on-field accomplishments, but also for his infectious laugh, warm, outgoing personality and huge heart.

Rob Ruck's Raceball

Rob Ruck's Raceball is an entertaining look at the development of black and Latino participation in baseball. He traces this from the Negro Leagues to Cuba to Mexican leagues the academies in the Dominican Republic. For baseball history, it's a great read--lots of interesting tidbits and interviews. Analytically, it falls a bit short.

The subtitle of the book is "How the Major Leagues Colonized the Black and Latin Game." This is obviously provocative and ends up more complicated than that. The essence of his argument about the Negro Leagues was that MLB integration destroyed them, which over time decreased African American interest in baseball. This stands in clear tension to the fact that African Americans were trying very hard to integrate. In other words, this isn't simply one agent acting upon another. As Ruck notes, Jackie Robinson is now considered a national hero--hardly an accomplice in colonization.

The part on Mexico was my favorite, not only for the stories but for the outcome, which unfortunately is less unanalyzed. A fight to attract American players in the 1940s eventually led to MLB agreeing to pay for Mexican players they wanted. That led to strong Mexican leagues, but Ruck jumps straight to Fernando Valenzuela without examining how Mexico succeeded so well.

The book ends with the suggestion that somehow MLB will destroy Latin American baseball: "And if it's lost, the last, best piece of baseball's soul may go with it" (p. 235). Sounds dire, but it comes soon after an interview with Juan Marichal--an icon of both MLB and the DR--says he thinks the Dominican academies are great. So how do we square that?

For a book that emphasizes three Latin American countries, one drawback is that there are virtually no Spanish-language sources at all--books, newspapers, documents, etc. (so that a chapter called "Viva Mexico!" relies on the NYT and WaPo) That is a major drawback for the thesis because it removes the Latin American voice from the equation--to what degree did they believe they were being colonized, or that the experience was negative in some form?

Yasiel Puig's Journey

Read this story about how Yasiel Puig got to the United States. It's a mix of Cuban repression, Mexican organized crime violence, and U.S. capitalism, which come together to haunt an amazingly talented young man. The collision of communism and capitalism is nasty.

All I can say is: think twice before getting annoyed at Puig, whose behavior gets plenty of negative attention in part because of his salary and in part because he's Cuban. He's been through more than you will ever deal with. And after reading that, I can only hope he doesn't fall apart completely before long. I hate the Dodgers but I can't help but root for him to overcome it. Many players without his raw skills will not.

Dirk Hayhurst's Bigger Than the Game

I bought Dirk Hayhurst's new book, Bigger Than the Game, as soon as it came out because I knew I'd like it. This is the third book in a baseball trilogy and the previous two were fascinating and funny.

This one is no different, but it's actually much less about playing baseball than about dealing with baseball. It starts with the self-inflicted shoulder injury (lifting too much weight) he got in the offseason after 2009 and how he dealt with injury during the entire 2010 season. That included depression, using pills to make himself sleep and get numbed, having people know about his first book, a run-in with an arrogant teammate who did not like him writing and talking to the media, and rehab (with a cameo by wrestler Triple H).

Baseball is a conservative game in many ways--players have their codes, things are done this particular way, and you must not rock the boat. The mere idea of letting people see inside scares baseball players, and seeing inside is what Hayhurst does. He goes off about the player who kept confronting him (different reviews speculate differently, but he may just be an amalgam) as well as a few others, in large because he's not respecting the game and instead is trying to be bigger than baseball, which is a sin.

In some way all of his books are about his efforts to figure himself out. You get the impression that he was finally getting there at the end of this one. He thought hard about what baseball means and how he should fit into it. He learned how not to care about others' perception of his role in it. Like many other entertainers--such professional wrestlers--the fans see you as a commodity and not as a person. Players buy into the image, which feeds their self-image and self-worth.

Everyday dumbasses get on the internet and debate your worth like you're a fucking commodity. But instead of trying to say we're not a commodity, we just want to be the most valuable commodity possible. Everyone wants to be the hyped, processed, nostalgia-injected product instead of being an actual fucking person (p. 125).

The player who didn't like him hated the fact that Hayhurst might puncture the bubble they live in and value so highly--just chatting too often with the team's own media person (who in many ways helps nurture the image!) was crossing the line. As he points out, though, this is already slowly changing. Glacially yes, but social media is here now and not going away. Way too few baseball players write real books but reality is spilling out in bits and pieces.

And like the rest of the books, it's funny and self deprecating. As he said to his book agent:

"My style is being honest about failing in a game that everyone thinks you're a winner in simply by playing" (p. 232).

I'm guilty of that feeling, and like how Hayhurst has made me think more broadly. If you're a baseball fan, you should check out all three.

Jerry Coleman, Voice Of My Childhood

Jerry Coleman died yesterday. Since he was 89, it was no surprise but for me a very sentimental moment because he was the voice of my childhood. When I was about two years old he became the announcer of the San Diego Padres, and as a Padres big lifelong fan his voice is imprinted very deeply in my brain.

What's so remarkable, though, is what a tremendous person he was. He won Rookie of the Year for the Yankees but also was a hero for the Marines during World War II and the Korean War. In every single interview with or reference to him, he was humble and self-effacing despite the fact that he was extraordinarily successful.

As a teenager, in 1985 I think, my birthday gift from my parents was a trip to Yuma, Arizona (only a few short hours from San Diego) to see the Padres in spring training. In preparation, I had managed to find a 1952 Topps Jerry Coleman card. Before a game, I walked up to the booth, which was open in the small stadium, said hello, and he signed my card.




At the time I knew a bit about his baseball background, but that was it. What I really knew was that this guy was the voice of my team, and he couldn't have been nicer.

Appropriately, on Twitter people have been linking to his calls, the one that clinched the 1984 pennant being the most memorable (it's impossible to forget that it was a one hopper to Nettles, to Wiggins, and the Padres have the national pennant). His signature was "Oh, doctor!" and "You can hang a star on that, baby!" often together in that order. When the Padres played at San Diego Stadium/Qualcomm they got in the habit of hanging a star out of the broadcasting booth on a sort of fishing pole.

So he was not only old, but had lived a pretty amazing life. Nonetheless, for all Padres fans it's just a sad moment.

Andy Masur has a nice post here.

Eric Pettis' Just A Minor Perspective

Eric Pettis' Just A Minor Perspective was the perfect light, short book I needed around finals. It is his account for low-A short season baseball in Williamsport. In many ways it's about becoming a small cog in a very big machine, and becoming a set of numbers rather than a person. Even the numbers are hard to parse--he made the All Star team and his stats are good (the book ends on a high note) but he has not played since 2011. Baseball is just not a very forgiving profession.

He takes it all in, the college player suddenly thrust into professional sports, and is quite perceptive and funny. He was humbled by the draft (where he was first ignored and then picked very late) and remained level-headed, despite the grind and constant PBJs:

Even though we were assured by our trainer that "it's actually good pregame meal," my intestines didn't always agree. But humans are made to adapt, even it if is to peanut butter and jelly.

Why is it that pitchers, especially relievers, seem to have the most writing talent and eye for the funny and unusual? These are fun books but it would be great to see some more variety--don't tell me there isn't some smart catcher or power hitter.

Feminism and Take Me Out to the Ball Game

A quick baseball interlude.

Had you ever thought of "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" as a feminist song? Well, now you will--John Thorn, who is the official historian of Major League Baseball (and wrote a great book on the origins of baseball that I reviewed in 2011) reprinted a study of the song.

Although this memorable chorus of peanuts and Cracker Jack is part of our national consciousness, the song’s little-known verses tell a deeper story, about a woman and her desire to be part of the rooting crowd. Her name was Katie Casey, and in 1908 she was affirmably baseball’s biggest fan. Katie Casey was base ball mad,Had the fever and had it bad;Just to root for the home town crew, Ev’ry sou Katie blew.On a Saturday, her young beauCalled to see if she’d like to go,To see a show But Miss Kate said “no, I’ll tell you what you can do:[1]“Take Me Out to the Ball Game” was Katie’s well known reply, but in 1908, a woman at the ballpark rooting and cheering was neither a common sight, nor was it fully accepted. “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” advertises just the opposite: that a woman’s place was indeed in the grandstand at the ballpark and not just safe at home.

At the time, he notes, women were sometimes seen at baseball games but it is was not widespread and there was a lot of male resistance. But it goes even further in terms of social implications:

These were the Katie Caseys of the factories who eventually took to the streets in search of better working conditions and higher pay. The tune that these women were singing was also an “infectious” one, and society would have to “get every word.” Women wanted empowerment, and Katie Casey’s fictionalized declaration for a female presence in the grandstand was a reverberation of these workers’ demands for equality. Once they reached their own chorus of assimilation, they too could never go back.

What a cool story!

Cuba Rents Baseball Players

A student pointed out this story to me by Anne-Marie Garcia and Peter Orsi. There is a long history of Cuban baseball players defecting to the United States. (In fact, Yasiel Puig or José Fernandez will certainly get the NL Rookie of the Year instead of the Padres' Jedd Goyrko. But that's another story). Now Raul Castro says Cuban players can essentially be rented to U.S. teams as long as they fulfill certain professional responsibilities at home. And, of course, pay taxes on their lucrative contracts.

I'll be curious to see whether the Obama administration opens the doors to this initiative, which requires waivers of some sort because the Cubans will not become permanent residents. They will simply be Cubans making money in the United States and sending a large amount of dollars back to Cuba.

Of course, this also higlights the authoritarian nature of Cuban immigration policy. You can leave the country only under certain specific conditions that benefit the government, and in this case presumably there are plenty of strings the governments can pull.

At the very least, it seems less like indentured servitude as the Cuban doctors in Venezuela (and, interestingly, my student's cousin, a Cuban dentist, was sent to Venezuela and then defected).

Intimidators in August

There is nothing quite like minor league baseball in the summer. Last night we went to see the Kannapolis Intimidators, single A team of the White Sox. It was a hot (90 degrees or so when we arrived) late afternoon game against the Delmarva Shorebirds.

You never know what might happen at a game. For example, out of nowhere they started throwing bags of peanuts, including one almost directly at my head. They went very nicely with cold beer.

And minor league games are great for kids because there is so much to do. The Intimidators let kids run the bases after Sunday games. My youngest daughter is the one in pink halfway between first and second.

Next year the Charlotte Knights (AAA for the White Sox) will start playing downtown, rather than over the border in South Carolina, which is really far from us. We'll then get to the Knights too, but Kannapolis is always such a great place to see a game.