Cuban Ballplayers Feared Dead
Four Cuban baseball players and a pitching coach who left for the United States on a flimsy boat a week ago haven't been heard from, and their families fear they're lost at sea.
Miami sports agent Joe Cubas, who has helped several Cuban ballplayers defect over the years, received a call last week from worried family members, who said the men had left March 10, the agent's spokesman, Rene Guim, said Tuesday.
Cubas alerted the group Brothers to the Rescue, which flies over the waters between the United States and Cuba searching for rafters, but pilots haven't found any sign of the players.
He also visited a refugee camp in the Bahamas, where Cuban rafters intercepted at sea are housed, but didn't find the group of ballplayers.
"The families are fearful because they haven't heard anything from them," Guim said. "They said they got on a flimsy boat, and they were worried that maybe they didn't make it."
All five were banned from baseball on the island last July because Cuban authorities suspected they were planning to defect.
Those missing, all from the Cuban national team, are:
- Jorge Luis Toca, 23-year-old first baseman.
- Angel Lopez, 25-year-old catcher.
- Jorge Diaz, 23-year-old second baseman.
- Orlando Chinea, pitching coach, believed to be 41.
- Also missing is Michael Jova, a 17-year-old shortstop from Cuba's junior Olympic team.
Hernandez, was Cuba's top pitcher, until he was banned from baseball on the communist island for his contacts with the Miami sports agent, Cubas. He fled Cuba Dec. 26 on a crowded boat with several others.
A year before he was banned, his half-brother, Livan Hernandez, defected on team trip to Mexico. Livan Hernandez, 22, went on to fame and riches with the Florida Marlins and was named MVP of the 1997 World Series.
Written by Evan Perez ©1998 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed