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VICE World of Sports Episode Guide: Las Grandes Ligas

Cuban ball players are willing to literally risk it all—family, citizenship, finances, and sometimes even their lives—just to get a shot at the major leagues.
Photo by Jerry Ricciotti

"Cubans dream big, and nowhere is that more evident than on the baseball field. Baseball mirrors the everyday struggles and triumphs of the people who live in this isolated island nation. Many sacrifice everything to follow their Major League dreams, but not all of them make it." - Julio Pabón, VICELAND producer on Las Grandes Ligas

Cuba By the Numbers

Population: 11,238,317

Estimated number of visa-less Cubans in the U.S. in 2015: 43,154

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Increase in visa-less Cubans in the U.S. since 2004: 6 times — up from 7,211

Number of Cubans found trying to reach the U.S. illegally in 2013: 2,129

Number of Cubans playing in MLB: 27

Number of Cubans playing in MLB who are All Stars: 10

Sport and Society

Béisbol is Cuba's national sport. Set foot in Havana for more than a day, and you're guaranteed to hear the crack of a bat at some street corner. The irony to the whole situation is that socialist Cuba, which goes to great lengths to differentiate itself from the U.S.'s "imperialist" ways, loves America's favorite pastime more than anything. So much so that Cuban ball players are literally willing to risk it all—family, citizenship, finances, and sometimes even their lives—just to get a shot at baseball's biggest stage.

Read More: The Rays in Cuba, the Faces in the Crowd: Photo Essay

Baseball was being played in Cuba as early as the 1864—34 years before Theodore Roosevelt and his rough riders set hoof on Cuban soil for the Spanish-American war in 1898. In the 1860's, Cuban students returning from U.S. colleges and U.S. sailors helped bring the sport to the island. Baseball caught fire fast and the first game of the Cuban professional league was held in 1878, between Habana and Almendares, with only one other team in the league, Matanzas. With Cuba struggling to gain independence from Spain, baseball became a symbolic form of rebellion against colonial sports such as bullfighting. You could almost call the introduction of baseball revolutionary in and of itself.

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Photo of the Habana baseball club, circa 1930.

The migration of professional ballplayers between the two countries didn't always travel from Cuba to the U.S. like it does today. Starting in 1900, the Cuban league admitted black players, unlike the segregated National League in the U.S. at the time. This enticed players from the Negro Leagues to come down to play baseball in Cuba during the off-season. While the U.S. suffered its low-scoring "dead-ball" era, the Cuban league flourished with the influx of American talent. Conversely, the Cuban influence became so popular in the States, that the Negro League adopted two teams—the Cuban Stars and the New York Cubans—that were primarily filled with Cuban and Latin-American players.

After coming down from the Sierra Madre mountain range to overthrow military dictator and U.S.-backed President Fulgencio Bautista in 1959, a certain revolutionary by the name of Fidel Castro abolished all professional sports, claiming that pro baseball contradicted the goals of the revolution. Professional sports, being the capitalist venture that they are, stood in stark contradiction to the socialist ideals Castro set forth. While this may have seemed like a death sentence for baseball, it actually gave new life to pre-existing amateur leagues throughout the country. Prior to the revolution, in the 1930s, sugar mill and tobacco workers had already assembled a league to distract themselves from the hardships of working the factories and fields. So Fidel saw these amateur leagues as his avenue to repurpose the role of sports—to use it as a way to flex military prowess and national fitness. It also worked as a way to promote the Revolution's agenda on an international stage.

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Fidel Castro wasn't all that good at baseball, it turns out.

Today, in the Serie Nacional, Cuba's top amateur league, players are paid somewhere around $17 per month, topping out at $100, so the allure of the major leagues couldn't be stronger. In 2013, Cuba began to allow players to play in select foreign countries like Japan and Mexico. Players like Yulieski Gourriel, whose father Lourdes played ball for Cuba in the '80s and '90s, were able to try their hand in bigger leagues abroad.

Catching Up With…

VICE Sports Editor in Chief Jorge Arangure Jr., who has been reporting on baseball in the Caribbean since 2004, was a producer on this episode of VICE World of Sports. Last year, Arangure took his first trip to Cuba as part of the shoot, reflecting on his experiences with sport on the island in his series The Cuba Diaries. We asked him a few questions about his time observing the baseball scene down there.

What were some of your biggest pre-Cuba assumptions you had challenged when you got there?

Because of all the stereotypes, most people tend to think that Cuba is this impoverished, sad place. And certainly you see poverty. But not on the scale you'd see elsewhere in Latin America. I've had the fortune to travel to many places around Latin America on assignment, and Cuba is unique in that you don't see the total poverty you see in other countries. People in Cuba don't have much. But everyone has a little bit of something.

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For Americans, Cuba can feel like a mysterious, secretive place—people romanticize it like crazy. But what do you feel like the mystique of America—and MLB—is like for Cuban ballplayers?

I'd say the allure of MLB is bigger than the allure of the United States. These players want to compete in the best league in the world to prove they belong. Certainly the money aspect plays a factor. But a lot times, these players don't have a real conception of what it means to get a $50 million contract because they've never had anywhere near that kind of money to spend. At some point the contract number just becomes a way to compare themselves to other players who have signed.

But the desire to play at the highest level is real. During our conversation with Yulieski Gourriel you could tell how much it pained him that he might not ever play in the Majors. Of course, now he's defected and will play in the majors soon, but back then when we spoke to him, the fear was real.

Why do you think baseball is so popular in Cuba?

It's the national sport. It's so ingrained in the culture that people just grow up with baseball in their lives. You can make a case that soccer is really making inroads in Cuba. You see kids everywhere with Barcelona and Real Madrid shirts. But until Cuba starts to actually produce high level soccer players, baseball will remain king. Baseball was the sport of the revolution. We all know how much Fidel loves the game. And he would use the sport to push his agenda both inside and outside the country.

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What's it like for Cubans to be at one of these camps in Puerto Rico or the Dominican Republic? Is it a purgatorial feeling, or do these guys have any kind of "we made it" vibe already, even though they're not in America yet?

I'd say it's very alienating. Most people would want to believe that Cuban players will adjust fine in the Dominican Republic because it's a Spanish speaking country. But that's a very simplistic way of looking at things. These players are still far away from their families. They have to deal massive economic changes to their day to day lives. And the Dominican is a unique country with its own set of problems.

The glut of Cuban arrivals has also caused some anger in the Dominican baseball community. A lot of trainers in the Dominican resent that Cuban players are starting to get all the money. So it's a complicated relationship.

How many Cuban players would you estimate make this third country journey each year?

I honestly don't have an answer to this. It's impossible to track and MLB doesn't release how many players from Cuba they've declared free agents. A lot of this is done clandestinely, so it's not an easy thing to track.

What is the greatest challenge for Cuban nationals trying to play in the major league? Is there anything different about the playing style?

To be honest, the playing is not incredibly different. The biggest challenge is simply adjusting to life in the United States. It's not easy to be in a foreign country where you don't speak the language. A lot of time these guys don't have anyone around from their home country to help support them. They leave an island but then they are on another island here in the U.S., so to speak. The guys making the huge contracts have it a bit easier. The team provides a support system. But the unheralded guys really have it tough.

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What is the like for Cuban players like Mario Luis (from the episode) who can't make it to the major leagues?

The story of the guys who don't make it is really an under-covered aspect of the Cuban baseball/MLB experience. There are far more guys who don't make it. And what becomes of them is really unfortunate. They leave their country seeking a dream but they have no backup plan. A lot of them, like Mario, end up isolated, struggling to make cash, and without any other options.

What's it like for the young Cuban players just starting out? How much pressure? Also, do coaches talk openly about going to the U.S. with promising young talent, or is that kind of hush-hush?

Young Cuban players face some pressure when they start out, but it's something they quickly become accustomed to. The top players will have started playing for some form of Cuban national team before they are even teenagers. So they are accustomed to a high pressure environment almost immediately.

Of course it gets fairly intense when they reach the National Series, especially for players who are on the big teams.

Players are starting to feel more comfortable about talking about the majors. It used to be practically forbidden. But we found players to be pretty open about hoping to one day play in the United States. I think everyone sees this possibility as being so close. And so everyone is just anxious for it to happen.

Any favorite memories from your trip?

My overall feeling after leaving Cuba was that the people are just really anxious for relations with the United States to completely open up. Everyone senses change coming. They just want it to happen as soon as possible so that perhaps it helps their lives, and their family's lives. The people were absolutely great. I met so many fantastic and interesting people. It was a trip that I'll never forget. And I feel we were there (January, 2015) at a really unique time. It was about a month after President Obama's announcement about opening up relations. Outside companies had not yet started to pry themselves into Cuba. Everyone was excited and looking forward to the future, and wondering how things would be different.