This image is the cover for the book Cuba's Baseball Defectors

Cuba's Baseball Defectors

“Takes an inside look into the wave of player departures that has rocked the game both in Cuba and the U.S., while providing historical perspective.” —USA Today

The stellar play and fascinating backstories of exiled Cuban sluggers and hurlers has become part of Major League Baseball history. On-field exploits by colorful Dodgers outfielder Yasiel Puig, AL rookie-of-the-year José Abreu, home run derby champion Yoenis Céspedes, radar-gun busting Cincinnati fast-baller Aroldis Chapman, and a handful of others have been further enhanced by feel-good tales of desperate Cuban superstars risking their lives to escape Fidel Castro’s communist realm and chase an American Dream of financial and athletic success. But a truly ugly underbelly to this story has also slowly emerged—one that involves human smuggling operations financed by Miami crime syndicates, operated by Mexican drug cartels, and conveniently ignored by ball clubs endlessly searching for fresh waves of international talent.

Given rare access to Cuba and its ballplayers, Peter C. Bjarkman has spent over twenty years traveling to all corners of the island getting to know the top Cuban stars and witnessing their struggles and triumphs. In this book, Bjarkman places events in the context of Cuban baseball history and tradition before delving into the stories of the major Cuban stars who have left the island. He reveals their personal histories, explains the events that led them to defect from their homeland, and details their harrowing journeys to US shores. Players whose big-league dreams failed are also discussed, as are Cuba’s efforts to stem the defection tide through working agreements with the Japanese and Mexican leagues. Cuba’s Baseball Defectors will fascinate baseball fans, those interested in the history of US-Cuba relations, and those wanting to learn more about the unsavory story of human trafficking in the name of baseball glory.

“A revelation . . . an original social history for sports enthusiasts and readers interested in past and future Cuba–U.S. ties.” —Library Journal

Includes photos

Peter Costa Bjarkman

Peter C. Bjarkman is the senior writer for www.BaseballdeCuba.com, the leading source in Spanish and English for current Cuban League and Cuban national team coverage. He is the author of A History of Cuban Baseball, 1864-2006 (2007) and coauthor of Smoke, the Romance and Lore of Cuban Baseball (1999, with Mark Rucker). Bjarkman has made numerous media appearances as an expert on Cuban baseball, including a featured role as Anthony Bourdain’s guide to island baseball on the 2011 Travel Channel episode “No Reservations Cuba.” He appears as a featured head on ESPN’s “30 for 30” documentary, “Brothers in Exile” and has appeared several times on the popular ESPN feature “Outside the Lines.” Bjarkman was a recipient of the Society for American Baseball Research's 2017 Henry Chadwick Award, established to honor the game's great researchers.

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