overseas briefing Take me out to the ball game (for 30 cents)

Author: Sam Morrill

HAVANA - As the first month of Major League Baseball comes to a close, 90 miles south of Florida the champion has already been decided. Santiago de Cuba beat the defending champion Havana Industriales last Wednesday in the decisive sixth game of the Cuban Baseball Finals. Although Santiago boasted the best regular season record, the victory was still considered an upset as the Industriales are historically the most successful team in Cuba. Dubbed "los Yankees de Cuba," they are expected to win every season and anything less than a championship is considered a complete disappointment - or a sign that there is a God - depending on whose side you're on.

Although Cuban baseball is played just as it is in America, the way the game manifests itself in the stadiums and in public is considerably different. Let's start with the price of admission. While I gladly shell out $10 for a seat in the bleachers in the Bronx, in Cuba one peso (approximately five cents) gets you a general admission ticket, which means that if the seat is empty, it's yours.

In a stadium that seats 50,000 fans, I regularly sit directly behind home plate, which is a surprisingly unpopular spot due to the fact that no foul balls land there by virtue of the safety net - for most Cubans the opportunity to bring home a stitched, leather baseball is too good to forfeit for a slightly better seat.

Food at the games is equally reasonable. Five pesos (25 cents) buys a hot dog, a bag of popcorn or a ham and cheese sandwich. That means that a hot dog here costs five times the price of admission-if American stadiums were to follow that pricing model, a hot dog would go for about $250.

Like most facets of Cuban society, pelota is just one more outlet to promote la revoluciÛn. Stadiums are named after famous revolutionaries, not just those from Cuba but from other countries as well. Take the Estadio Agusto Sandino for instance, which is named for the Nicaraguan general who fought against the American occupation of Nicaragua in the early 20th century. In lieu of advertisements, billboards in the stadiums promote political slogans.

Still, to most Cubans there is nothing political about baseball. Solidarity had nothing to do with Alexander Mayeta's 10 home runs in the playoffs, and there was nothing revolutionary about Arleys Sanchez's decision to intentionally walk Alexei Bell with runners on second and third. If anything, baseball is a dividing force within Cuba as each province's team is comprised entirely of players from that province, so games invariably become a matter of regional pride. Perhaps that is the best part of Cuban baseball - the fact that players grew up rooting for the team they currently play for and live near the stadium they play in. For fans, there is never any doubt as to where the players' loyalties lie.

The players are celebrities, but not in the same cordoned-off way that they are in the U.S. While major-leaguers play for glory, fame and millions of dollars, Cubans play with the same intensity for nothing more than bragging-rights and about $15 per month.