Relations between the United States and Cuba continue to thaw after more than a half century of acrimony, and baseball is helping to facilitate this transition.
On Tuesday, the Rays will play an exhibition game against the Cuban National Team. Among the spectators will be President Barack Obama, a truly historic moment that will once again shine a light on the island nation’s love for baseball.
Cuba is a land full of visual contrasts and paradoxes. Decay and beauty coexist side-by-side everywhere. An outlier in an increasingly homogenized world, todays Cuba is relatively advertising free, although it was a hotbed of consumer culture in the years prior to Fidel Castro’s rise to power in 1959.