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WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC: SEMIS & FINALSMarch 20, 2006Frederich CepedaHiginio VelezSAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA THE MODERATOR: If you have a question please step up to the podium. Please be brief. If you have more than one question we'll try to take your second or third as long as we have time. Also we ask that you please keep your personal conversations down and if you could also turn off your cell phones. We thank you for your cooperation, and have a good night. Q. This is a question for Manager Velez. Manager Velez, you went through the first round, then you moved onto the second round, you played against teams such as the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. You don't play much, but you're very well acquainted with the baseball that is played in Korea and Japan. Do you think that your strong card this night was Romero and Palma, and why didn't you use those cards? HIGINIO VELEZ: First of all, allow me to congratulate Japan. That is the first thing that I want to say this evening. They deserve these words of congratulations for the way they played this evening, the courage, the type of game that they played, and for having classified -- you see what happened with Japan, they classified by run average we could say, by the defeat of Mexico over the U.S. With regard to the part starting pitcher, Romero. Palma had not been very good and if you follow what Romero had been doing throughout the classic, others have been very good throughout, this was not his game. Romero was the first one in taking us against Puerto Rico, he was the first one in taking us to the final, and I trusted Romero the way he was pitching. Today he didn't do that with his control, his speed, but this is what happens in baseball. Q. This is for the manager. When the Japanese changed pitchers to (Shunsuke) Watanabe in the fifth inning, first you had some difficulties, but it looked like your team was getting good swings against him in the 6th inning. Did you tell your men or with your coaches discuss how to attack Watanabe and his very additional and unusual style? HIGINIO VELEZ: All those who are well-acquainted with baseball and who have followed this closely and know a lot about baseball know that when you have a good pitcher, a top-quality pitcher as you did with Japan, it is very difficult to hit, very difficult to bat. When you move onto the second pitcher who does not have the same speed, has a different style, and our team doesn't give up; our team continued to fight with courage, but with this other pitcher it was very difficult to do that. When you have a pitcher of the quality as (Daisuke) Matsuzaka has, we tried to hit to center field, we tried to do it to the different infield sections, but it was just less hits than we had during the first innings. Q. This is a question addressed to Manager Velez. It is said that in order to be a champion you even have to beat the umpires, and there have been several calls and several complaints about the umpires. Japan suffered it, Mexico did, too, and tonight we had a few calls. Anything to say about that? HIGINIO VELEZ: I never like to play against umpires. I always believe that umpires tend to be honest and they do their job. But tonight, for those of you who are well acquainted with baseball, and those sitting here know a lot about baseball, you saw what happened, and the umpire at home and first base umpire, they left much to be desired. It seems to me that they should always leave it in the hands of the sluggers, the hitters to decide. I don't think they do it with ill intention or with anything behind it, but it seems to me that tonight they didn't do what they should have done in tonight's game. But I leave it up to you to draw your own conclusion. This is a game that will go down in history. This is the first Classic, it was the first final game of a Classic, and most of the people can go back home, watch it at home in slow motion, on video, on TV. You can edit it, do whatever you want, but as I said previously, draw your own conclusions. Q. For both gentlemen, when you came into the baseball classic, there were many people who questioned how well Cuba to compete against these other teams. What do you think you showed the rest of the world? Do you feel that there are players on your team that could play in the major leagues, and would you hope one day that the relations might change and allow Cuban players to play in the major leagues? FREDERICH CEPEDA: Well, this Classic is history, it is truly an historic event in baseball. What Cuba has shown to the world is not only that we could play up to par with other major leaguers. We are not professional, we are amateur, we don't get paid for doing this. We deserve a high place in baseball because we do this with sacrifice, with human value and courage and sportsmanship and because we give our utmost in order to come into the field and show what good baseball is all about. We won second place. We ran second in this tournament, in this classic, and it was well deserved. As to being happy, I'm not happy because I don't like losing. But I'm happy with the result on the other hand because we made it all the way to the final round. Cuba has shown to the world that we have our heart in baseball, that we want to play baseball because of the quality of it in every single tournament. HIGINIO VELEZ: Well, regarding the quality of Cuban baseball, we have shown already what Cuban baseball can do. I cannot speak of the differences that exist between amateurs and Cuban baseball and major leaguers and amateurs, but one thing I can say, if there is someone -- if there are people we admire, we respect and we love are the major leaguers. Cuba with its baseball, with the quality, with the patience, and as was interpreted when I said that it was men and not names, we have high respect for major leaguers in the U.S., we admire them, we follow them, we see how they play. We have great respect for them, and what they got and what they get and what they still have is something that they obtained through sacrifice, through their sweat. Nothing they get is for free. More than 95 percent of the major leaguers in the U.S. come from the very low classes, from the humble classes, so what they do is with their effort, with their sweat, their sacrifice and with their love for baseball. Cuba, regarding the fact that it could be part of the major league, that's not for me to say. It is up to you. You've seen what we can do in the field, you've see how they play baseball. It is not up to me to say. We came all the way to the final. We played this game for the gold medal, and it was not for free. It was not a gift that was given to Cuba. We were put in that pool. It was called the death pool, the death group, and we made it through to the final. We cannot always win, but we want to thank all those who pushed for Cuba to be here, for the friendship, for the respect, for everything that was shown for this team, for the Cuban team, the baseball team. We want to thank you all. Thank you for being here. Q. The question is divided into two. First of all, words of congratulations for a wonderful tournament. It was a great Classic that was played. My question would be could you draw a balance on the results of the tournament for baseball, what it means, what the impact of this Classic is for baseball in general and for the future of baseball? Do you think that such a tournament like this Classic can be consolidated, and can it contribute so that perhaps in the future, maybe for the Olympics in London in 2012, baseball could come back as one of the Olympic sports? HIGINIO VELEZ: Even though we were not here as teams that only wanted to win, it seems to me that tonight Cuba did not win; Japan won and we congratulated Japan for that. But you know who ended up winning? Baseball did, sports did, sportsmanship did. We are in favor of the reinsertion of baseball into the Olympics, but we |
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