MADRID, Spain.- The island’s sports authorities announced this Tuesday that the format of the Cuban Baseball Elite League will be changed, a tournament that has only experienced one edition, and quite unfortunate, according to the fans.
The II Elite League, scheduled to begin on November 4, will no longer have the Tobacco, Port, Central, Livestock, Farmers, and Coffee teams; Rather, the first six places of the current National Baseball Series (SNB) will compete, so they will be known at the end of the SNB quarterfinals.
After the failure of the I Elite League, marked by the lack of fans in the stadiums, it could be assumed that this change in format tries to have at least the followers of those teams.
Each team will have between 10 and 12 reinforcements and will play 40 games, eight against each rival, in the preliminary phase that should conclude on December 22, the authorities said at a conference held in the Adolfo Luque Hall of the Latin American Stadium in Havana, directed by the president of the Cuban Baseball Federation and National Commissioner of the discipline, Juan Reinaldo Pérez Pardo.
During the meeting, reviewed by the official mediaIt was also specified that from December 26 to 30 the pending matches will be recovered.
The four best placed will reach the playoffs, competing in two subseries (first against fourth and second against third) of seven games to win four.
The semifinals will be held between January 6 and 14, 2024, and the title discussion will be between January 17 and 25.
The I Elite League, elite had nothing
The I Elite League, held between October 2022 and January 2023, far from becoming the highest level amateur tournament of this discipline in the country as the regime intended, once again confirmed the low level of the current ball on the Island.
Before it started, it sparked controversy over the choice of players and its start date had to be postponed due to the delay in the arrival of the team uniforms, by the company Teammate, when Pérez Pardo had ensured that all the logistics of the contest was guaranteed.
Likewise, it was marked by the unbridled exodus of young Cuban baseball players, and those who competed had practically the only motivation to attend the Caribbean Baseball Series in Greater Caracas.
