U.S. dropped ball by banning Cuba from first WBC

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In the midst of Old Havana, a couple of blocks away from El Floridita, where the daiquiri was introduced to a thirsty world, is Parque Central. It's not like New York's Central Park, more just a plaza, but most days Parque Central is distinguished by a group of noisy and animated men, doing nothing but sitting there and arguing about baseball. Such passion -- why, you've never even seen its likes in Fenway Park or Wrigley Field. Oh, would I love to be in Parque Central this March when the 16 most prominent nations of the diamond play in the first World Baseball Classic.

Only, of course, now our government has decreed that whereas Cuba can compete on U.S. soil in the Olympics, the World Cup and other international sports tournaments, we won't let them play in the inaugural World Baseball Classic. Some Americans simply cannot accept the notion that somewhere, somehow Cuba might make a couple lousy Yankee dollars.

Now, I am not one of those who subscribes to the fantasy that simply by playing games among countries, all politics fade away, that sport automatically produces peace, love and brotherhood. But the fact is, international sport usually has some benefits. And sometimes it really does demonstratively work for good. Remember the initial ping-pong diplomacy with Communist China? By all but forcing his way into South Africa's tennis open, Arthur Ashe first cracked the apartheid curtain, and it never could be fully closed again.

But in a declaration that is at once both petty and ham-handed, the Treasury Department has decreed that it must apply the same U.S. policy that hasn't worked for almost half-a-century, and refuse to allow Cuba to play against the other baseball nations of the world. In a way, this posture is even more distasteful than when those anti-Semitic countries refuse to play Israel. At least those nations have the strength of their convictions sufficient to take themselves out of the games. We're just being a bully. No, it's our bat and our ball, and you can't play.

Ironically, too, if we simply let Cuba into the Classic, we might even win some political points, because then Fidel Castro might be afraid to let his team go to Puerto Rico, where Cuba's first games were scheduled, for fear that some of his players would defect. How would the gentlemen of Parque Central like it if their own friendly dictator refused to let Cuba play baseball?

But no, the way it is now, once again, we'll be the villains before the world. Is there no sensitivity left in Washington, no sense of proportion whatsoever? These are games.

If our dim, short-sighted government maintains this stance, there is only one reasonable alternative. All of the players in the tournament, from China to Venezuela, from the Netherlands to Australia, from Canada to the Dominican Republic . . . and yes from wherever our own players come from in these United States of America -- all of these athletes must stand together in support of their baseball brethren of Cuba and tell the United States government: we're out. Everybody plays baseball or nobody plays baseball.

World Baseball Classic called on account of American hubris and stupidity.