Havana/Carlos Adrián Hernández, only 15 years old, is the most recent promise of Cuban baseball to escape. The young man left the country “in recent days” and arrived in the Dominican Republic. The pitcher’s departure was reported by expert Francys Romero this Tuesday, who noted that the athlete is looking to sign a contract with an MLB organization.
The Villa Clara player, says Romero, is projected to be a pitcher with a pitch speed above 90 miles per hour, the average reached in Major League baseball. The 1.85 meter tall young man is eligible to sign in the 2027-2028 period, according to the communicator.
Hernández was part of the pre-selection of the Cuba team that participated in the U-15 World Cup held in Mexico and which ended just last Sunday. The tournament meant one more failure for Cuban baseball, since the Island could not even fight for a medal.
The abandonment of athletes is beginning to take its toll on Cuban sports. As journalist Yasel Porto recalls, “one of the keys to this defeat is that the highest percentage of the highest-level Cuban players, aged 14 and 15, are in the Dominican Republic, in Major League team academies or in private ones in search of a contract.”
“One of the keys to this defeat is that the highest percentage of the highest level Cuban players, aged 14 and 15, are in the Dominican Republic”
The previous reported escape of a young baseball player was that of Leandro Forteza García19 years old, at the end of last September. The pitcher also arrived in the Dominican Republic, with the intention of signing a contract in the MLB.
The player from Sancti Spiritus was a member of the Cuba team in the U-18 World Cup in 2025 in Japan, and in three games in the championship he recorded two wins and one loss, with an earned run average allowed of 3.36, in addition to adding seven strikeouts in 8.1 innings.
According to Francys Romero’s record, Forteza García is the eighth member of Cuba’s World Cup team that participated in Japan to leave the Island.
Another case was that of Richard Bouqueta 17-year-old right-handed pitcher from Holguín, who left Cuba last July and came under the tutelage of Bailli Baseball, an academy in the Dominican Republic founded by former Cuban baseball player Kenen Bailli, who played in the National Series and the Major Leagues with Toronto.
The departure of these young people adds to the problems that Cuban baseball has been facing for years
Of that Cuban youth team, the first to leave the country was left-handed pitcher César Morales, from Villa Clara, in July 2025, who began training in Santo Domingo under representation of the Wasserman agency. He was followed by Marcos Fuentes, Alejandro Cairo and Cristian Rojas, in August of last year, while Javier Zambrano, in November.
The departure of these young people adds to the problems that Cuban baseball has been facing for years. On the one hand, it is estimated that of the more than 1,000 athletes who have left the Island in the last decade, at least 700 are young ballplayers with projection. To a large extent, the lack of growth and the few possibilities of having a better life force athletes to look for options far from the Island. An example is the poor salarieswhich reach 3,500 pesos for those who play in the National Series and 8,500 for those in the Elite League, in a country where a carton of eggs can reach 4,300 pesos.
Furthermore, results at the sporting level are increasingly poor. In the last World Baseball Classic, the one known as Team Asere had the worst performance in its historyafter not even qualifying for the second round, being eliminated after adding two wins and two losses.
In the last World Baseball Classic, the team known as Team Asere had the worst performance in its history
Before, except for the fortuitous fourth place obtained by the Cuban team in the last World Baseball Classic in 2023, the national team has only added failures in the different international events where it has appeared. in the tournament Premier 12which brings together the best teams in the world, the team went from sixth place in 2015 to penultimate place (11th), tied with Puerto Rico, in 2024.
International sporting events have become the ideal setting for athletes to escape, although they are not the only ones who take advantage of leaving the Island to leave the delegations. Another leak that was recently reported was that of an official journalist who was covering the U-15 Baseball World Cup in Mexico.
According to information also disclosed by Francys Romero, the reporter Giovanni Martínez, who also published a note in the newspaper Hit about Cuba’s defeat in its debut against the Dominican Republic, he left the delegation before the second match of the tournament, against South Africa, in a game that the Island won 16-0, according to the note from the same official sports newspaper, but already signed by Boris Luis Cabrera.
