Given the Dutch national baseball team’s recent visit to Cuba, where they undertook training sessions but were unfortunately prevented from playing a friendly five-inning game against the national squad in Havana’s Latinoamericano Stadium due to bad weather, Granma takes this opportunity to share some memories of the historic matches between the two countries.
Date: September 20, 2000. Location: Sydney Baseball Park. Event: Olympic Games baseball tournament. Teams: Cuba-The Netherlands.
For fans across the world – both in and outside of Cuba – this game would be a “pure formality” between a baseball powerhouse and a European country with a generally weak team. Four years earlier, during the Atlanta ‘96 Games, the clash between the two squads ended a staggering18-2 record; a story which everyone expected to be repeated.
This, however was not the case. To everyone’s surprise, the Dutch team defeated the Cubans 4-2. After a home-run from Omar Linares during the first inning, everything seemed to suggest that the Cuban team was on their way to securing their fourth tournament, and 22 consecutive victory since Barcelona 1992.
However, from then on through the ninth inning Dutch pitchers didn’t allow a single run, facing a line-up of Luis Ulacia, Yobal Dueñas, Omar Linares, Orestes Kindelán, Antonio Pacheco, Oscar Macías, Miguel Caldés, Ariel Pestano and Germán Mesa, while star pitcher Norge Luis Vera was replaced in the third after giving away four points, including a double by Henley Meulens, current coach to the Dutch national team.
This marked the beginning of a series of victories for the Dutch team against Cuba in important tournaments. One of the most painful took place in Panama City, during the Baseball World Cup, organized by the International Baseball Federation in 2011. In fact the Dutch selection secured two key wins during this competition, first in the qualifying round, helped by a relatively unknown Dominican pitcher Orlando Yntema, and then in the final for the gold medal and competition title, in which 1,000 strike-out veteran Rob Cordemans left the Cuban’s by the wayside.
Recently, during the Third World Baseball Classic held in Japan’s Tokyo Dome, Dutch pitchers thwarted Cuba 6-0 in a pre-tournament game, while a further two defeats (6-2 and 7-6) saw the island’s team forced to exit by the stadium’s main door, with their 7-6 loss seeing them miss out on a semifinal spot, in a game when a homerun by shortstop Harrelton Simmons drew the teams even, and a pop-up from Kalian Sams with a teammate on third base in the ninth inning finally ended the game.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF DUTCH BASEBALL
It was a surprise to many that the Netherlands, a famously soccer-loving country - with excellent results in global competitions – could have improved, seemingly overnight, in a sport as difficult as baseball. However, the country’s baseball history dates back to over a century ago, when in 1911, an English-born professor called J.C.G. Grassé took a vacation to the United States, and learned the basics of the game. Upon his return to the Netherlands, Grassé taught what he had learned to a group of students from the Amsterdam Ice Club.
At the beginning, baseball was concentrated in the capital but little by little it began to spread, later both the Dutch Baseball Federation and Europe’s oldest club, AHC Quick were founded. Then in the 1960s the Haarlem Baseball Week was organized, an event which saw the participation of foreign teams – including Cuba -, and helped to raise the level of the sport in the country.
In 1979, pitcher Bert Blyleven became the first of many successive Dutch players to make it to the Major Leagues, including: Andruw Jones (434 homeruns during his 17 season career), Hensley Meulens, Calvin Maduro, and Yurendell Decaster, not to mention the dozens of players in the U.S. and Caribbean minor leagues.
If anyone were to ask, what country has improved the most over recent years, the answer would be the Netherlands. Their triumph in Sydney, four years after a 16 run loss in Atlanta, can be considered a great achievement, while the team has become a genuine challenge for the Cuban squad in international competitions.
