MIAMI (AP) — A Venezuelan flag was stitched on the right side of Omar López's cap. And an American flag was positioned a few feet to his left.
Baseball, meet politics. Politics, meet baseball. Like it or not, it's happening.
The World Baseball Classic — already underway in Tokyo — starts pool play Friday in three other locations, including Miami. And, to no surprise, Venezuela's team is a top attraction for the games in Latin-centric South Florida.
Sporting events having geopolitical ties is nothing new, but the situation the Venezuelan team — managed by López — faces in this tournament is unusual. These games come two months after the U.S. executed a military operation in Venezuela to capture deposed leader Nicolás Maduro and bring him to New York to face drug trafficking charges.
“I’m going to be honest with you,” López insisted Thursday. “I’ve been working in baseball for 28 years and I don’t talk about political stuff, to be honest. I’m here to talk about our Venezuelan team. I’m not here to talk about anything about political situations around the world, around my country. We are alive, we are here and we want to play for our team to win every single game here.”
When news of Maduro's capture seeped out in the early morning hours of Jan. 3, many Venezuelans — it's believed, based on U.S. Census estimates, that about 200,000 people who identify as being from that country live in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale area — took to the streets in celebration. Much of that was centered in the Miami suburb of Doral, which has the largest Venezuelan population in South Florida and also is where President Donald Trump owns a golf resort that will host the G20 Summit later this year.
And based on just the numbers of tickets that are available and their resale prices online, Venezuela's four games at loanDepot Park — the home of the Miami Marlins — between Friday and Wednesday will draw large crowds.
“I’m super happy, super happy to be here in my city,” Marlins utilityman Javier Sanoja said. “I love Miami because it’s the closest we have to our country, and seeing it full of Venezuelans fills me with pride.”
That won't just be the case for Venezuelans, of course. Events like the WBC — not unlike the Olympics, the Ryder Cup and more — are designed to stoke national pride, even in unusual times both in the U.S. and abroad.
The tournament is beginning less than a week after the U.S. and Israel launched joint strikes on Iran to start a new war in the Middle East. At the WBC, the U.S. is playing its pool play games in Houston; Israel has its pool games in Miami. Cuba — a longtime political adversary of the U.S. — is opening in San Juan but could get to Miami if it advances out of pool play. And all of this, plus soccer's World Cup later this year, is happening amid an immigration crackdown that has some wondering if it's safe to even try and visit the U.S.
There were no noticeable protests outside the ballpark in Miami on Thursday when teams worked out, and it's unknown if there will be any sort of politically charged events either inside or outside the stadium when games happen over the next few days.
“To put it mildly, it’s interesting times right now,” Israel manager Brad Ausmus said. “So, I hope there is that kind of unifying joy that all these players, coaches, they’re representing their heritage, but they all have one thing in common and that’s baseball. I hope the fans enjoy it.”
Venezuela's players all say some version of the same thing, that they're here to play baseball — even with the country's deposed leader in a jail cell in New York. The political times, to those players, don't make the games any more or less significant.
“I don’t try to pay attention to that, you know,” Venezuela captain Salvador Perez said. “I understand when fans buy a ticket, they want to see the team win. Win or lose, it’s part of the game. ... I can control what I can control. The rest, God has control of that.”
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