It’s time for our annual Cuba baseball post which each year has been motivated by cold weather, spring training, and anxious anticipation of opening day. And what better subject for this post than the recently concluded trial in Miami in which Bartolo Hernandez, a baseball agent, and Julio Estrada, a baseball trainer, were accused of smuggling Cuban players into the United States and which featured testimony by one of these peleteros about how he ate his fake Haitian passport on his plane trip to the United States. (Insert optional better-than-airline-food joke here.)

One of the key elements of the case is section 515.505 of the Cuban Assets Control Regulation which unblocks Cuban nationals after they have established residency in a country outside Cuba other than the United States. The other element is that an unblocked Cuban in a third country is, under Major League Baseball’s rules, a “free agent” that can negotiate higher salaries; Cubans who come directly to the United States and become unblocked by seeking permanent residence here are eligible to be signed to an MLB team only through the amateur draft system and will not be able to command the astronomical salaries of a free agent.

According to prosecutors, the defendants smuggled the Cubans into third countries and then forged documents that could be used to evidence residency in those countries. The payoff to the defendants was the high commissions (allegedly around $150 million) that they received on the salaries of their free agent clients. The defense claimed that the two defendants did not forge documents and were unaware that the players, desperate to get to the United States, were using forged documents. The jury, however, convicted both men earlier today.

In other baseball news, opening day for the Chicago Cubs is Sunday, April 2, in St. Louis, a town that even the Rams had the good sense to escape.  Go Cubs Go!

ABOVE: Yulieski Gurriel

It’s cold outside. It’s been snowing. So it’s time, of course, to dream of spring training and the boys of summer. Let’s talk baseball. And OFAC. Batter up!

Wait, haven’t we said this before?  Indeed we have, just about the same time last year, when the MLB and OFAC were in a struggle, principally centered around Yoan Moncado, as to whether MLB would sign unblocked Cuban baseball players only with a specific license even though OFAC said that its general license in section 515.505 of the Cuban Assets Control Regulations was enough and that it wouldn’t issue a specific license for Cuban players. (The MLB blinked and now allows signing based on the general license.)

Early last Monday morning, Yulieski Gurriel and his brother Lourdes Jr., who were playing for Cuba in the Caribbean Series in the Dominican Republic disappeared from their hotel and later announced their intention to take part in the U.S. national pastime. Yulieski is one of the top players in Cuba and Lourdes Jr. is a well-ranked prospect as well. To be eligible for the general license, the brothers must establish residency outside Cuba. It then takes MLB a few more months to convince themselves that residency outside Cuba has been established. So don’t expect to see either of them (Yulieski in the majors and Lourdes Jr. in the minors) on opening day.

Of course, given the liberalization of the Cuban embargo, the question remains as to why the brothers have to cool their heels for 6-12 months before they can play ball. The latest round of liberalization lets people travel from the U.S. to Cuba for baseball and other “athletic competitions.” It would only make sense to even up the traffic in the other direction and let the Gurriels and others play baseball here before being unblocked. Even the perpetual Cuba blockade boosters club in Congress could hardly complain because such a rule would suck baseball talent out of Cuba and, far from propping up the current Cuban regime, might do more to bring it down than 50 years of economic sanctions.

For some bonus fun, here’s what Cuba had to say about the defection:

In the early morning on Monday two players abandoned the hotel where the Cuban baseball team attending the 58th Caribbean Series Baseball in the Dominican Republic was staying. Yulieski Gourriel and Lourdes Gourriel Castillo, in a blatant attitude of surrender, were taken in by the merchants of professional baseball. The event was immediately rejected by the other members of the Cuban team, who issued a statement.

Uh huh. Sure they did.

ABOVE: Yoan Moncado

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It’s cold outside. It’s been snowing. So it’s time, of course, to dream of spring training and the boys of summer. Let’s talk baseball. And OFAC. Batter up!

Baseball blogs, reporters and social media are a-twitter that Yoan Moncado, the 19-year-old baseball phenomenon from Cuba, is not currently able to sign with a Major League Baseball team because of OFAC and the embargo against Cuba.

The new Cuba regulations leave in place the general license, useful mostly to baseball teams, which unblocks Cuban nationals after they have taken up permanent residence in a country outside Cuba. Once a Cuban baseball player has been unblocked, he can be signed by a U.S. baseball team.

Moncado, it seems, has become a permanent resident of Guatemala. So what’s the hold-up? Well, it’s not OFAC. It’s worse. It’s fear of OFAC. Notwithstanding the provision unblocking Moncado, MLB, apparently fearing the ire of OFAC (and a mega-fine) if evidence of permanent residence outside Cuba is faked, still requires a specific license from OFAC prior to allowing a team to sign a Cuban player. The problem is OFAC is apparently saying that it won’t issue a specific license when the conditions for the general license are met. Unstoppable force, meet immovable object. Immovable object, meet unstoppable force.

According to an MLB memo, reported here, MLB and OFAC are in discussions to resolve this impasse. Don’t break out the Cuban cigars yet to celebrate Moncado’s signing.