Kuttler: Cuba beckons baseball purists with easing of embargo
From Hillel Kuttler at the Jewish Daily Forward on December 28, 2014, with SABR member Kit Krieger:
To the dismay of baseball fan Kit Krieger, future travels to Cuba will no longer include get-togethers with ex-Washington Senators pitcher Connie Marrero.
Marrero, who played for Washington from 1950 to 1954, died in Havana last April at age 102, a few months after Krieger’s last visit and three years after Krieger helped arrange for Marrero a $10,000 annual pension from Major League Baseball.
Theirs was a special friendship, one of many forged by Krieger, a Vancouver resident who will return to Cuba in late February — his 30th visit there beginning with a 1997 trip related to his job with the British Columbia teachers federation. That trip spawned a love affair with the country and its baseball scene.
Krieger, 65, would go on to found Cuba Ball, a company bringing baseball-mad tourists to the island nation — a venture begun really to enable himself to visit affordably with groups.
Read the full article here: http://forward.com/articles/211743/cuba-beckons-for-baseball-purists-with-easing-of-e/
Originally published: December 29, 2014. Last Updated: December 29, 2014.