Beautiful pitch from Trump
A few months ago, MLB made a deal to bring Cuban players to the U.S.
In all fairness, I support the idea of letting the best players play in the majors. It's good for the fans and for the game.
At the same time, Cuba's intention was not to let players play in the majors. It was another attempt at "renting" Cubans in exchange for dollars going to the state.
I am happy that President Trump killed the deal, as we see in this report:
The Trump administration on Monday canceled a deal that made it easier for Cuban baseball players to compete professionally in the United States — a decision that swiftly drew criticism from the Cuban Baseball Federation.
The move rolls back another Obama-era effort aimed at warming relations between the two countries.
The deal, reached in December, would have allowed Cuban citizens to play Major League Baseball without being forced to defect from the communist-run island and risk being banned from returning to the island. It also allowed the Cuban government to claim a fee from MLB teams that drafted Cuban players.
"The agreement with MLB seeks to stop the trafficking of human beings, encourage cooperation and raise the level of baseball. Attacks with political motivation against the agreement achieved harm (to) the athletes, their families and the fans," the state-run Cuban Baseball Federation said in a statement to CNN.
A Cuban baseball state agency is concerned about "attacks with political motivation"?
It was a bad deal from day one. I am amazed that the MLB players union accepted it.
Yes, we want Cuban players, but we do not want servants of the Cuban state. In other words, the solution is for the Cuban government to allow Cubans to negotiate directly with major league teams without Raúl Castro getting a piece of the action.
So — very good move by President Trump. My guess is that he just won Florida in 2020!
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