Female Cuban baseball player missing from Edmonton tournament

Castro: His Lips Got in the Way.

The last time a baseball player defected in Edmonton, Ron Hayter got blasted by Fidel Castro.

The chairman of the Edmonton International Baseball Federation, Hayter was held responsible by the Cuban leader after three players from his national team went missing in 2008 during the World Junior AAA Championships.

El Presidente was so angry he called Hayter from Havana, tracking him down at Telus Field.

“He was hostile,” Hayter said Tuesday as news spread about a possible defection here at the World Cup of Women’s Baseball. “He spoke enough English so that you knew exactly what he meant.

“He said, ‘Ron, you are the scum of the Earth.”’

...Hayter, a former Edmonton city councillor, said he has not officially been notified a defection occurred, but said it would not shock him. Enamoured with playing in the big leagues, a handful of Cuban men have defected in Edmonton over the years.

“The fact that this is a woman is what makes it different,” Hayter said. “That would be a first.”