Cuba “is going through a very delicate moment in boxing and baseball, also in wrestling,” says the five-time Olympic champion
14ymedio, Havana, September 26, 2025 — Cuban sports has fallen into an abyss and the fifth Olympic champion of wrestling himself, Mijaín López, recognizes it. In an interview with the agency France Presse (AFP) published this Thursday, the Giant of Herradura, ambassador of United World Wrestling and deputy in the National Assembly of People’s Power, urges the authorities to make “a change soon” in the situation of sports, which “is going through a very delicate moment, not only in boxing and baseball, but also in wrestling.”
During the conversation, which took place in the framework of the COB Expo, the annual fair of the Brazilian Olympic Committee, in Sao Paulo, López asks that they “review what must be done.”
The athlete also speaks of “openness” and suggests seeking to incorporate into Cuban sports the event sponsors and athletes. “Sports at the international level is a business… there are sponsors,” says López. And he adds: “The whole world sees this as normal, but this development has not arrived in Cuba.”
The retiring athlete cloaks his speech and avoids using the word “defection” but ends up accepting that the Island “has lost many talents” and that migration “has been a part of all these things going on.”
According to López, the Island needs athletes to be “known” by brands “in all professional aspects. He insists that a change must take place “because we are starting an Olympic cycle and it’s now noticeable that there is a lack of improvement in Cuban sports.”
In an interview with AFP, several of the Island’s recent failures were highlighted, such as the Under-18 World Baseball Championship and the Volleyball World Cup in Thailand, also the worst performance by a national boxing team, which barely won three bronze medals at the World Cup in Liverpool. Wrestling went through another difficult moment in Zagreb, reaching a third level thanks to the performance of the Olympic medallist, Milaymis Marín.
What has prevented the Cuban debacle in these disciplines is the first place of triple jumper Leyanis Pérez and the third places of triple jumper Lázaro Martínez and discus thrower Silinda Oneisi Morales in Athletics. However, one gold and six bronzes in five international events have raised alarm among the federations.
As for the flight of athletes, the most recent drop-outs were recorded at the Junior Pan American Games in Paraguay. Cuba won 19 gold medals, 13 silver and 15 bronze, but it had five defections: rowers Robert Landy Fernández, Félix Puente Batista and Keiler Ávila Núñez broke with the delegation after winning third place in the eight rowing crew event. They were joined by judoka Jonathan Delgado and shot putter Emanuel Ramirez.
Last June the heptathlete Marys Adela Patterson left her hotel in Austria and did not attend the opening of the event in Hypomeeting Gotzis. In April, judokas Héctor San Román and Naomis Elizarde sought refuge in Chile after their delegation won silver at a specialty championship in the South American country. In the middle of this month, handballers Naomis Mustelier, Islenia Parra and Nahomi Rodríguez left the senior women’s team participating in the North America and Caribbean (Norca) Championships in Mexico.
The five-time Olympic champion Mijaín López also spoke in the interview about the “deterioration of the training centers.” This newspaper reported that the damage to the infrastructure in the School of Sports Initiation (Eide), promoted by Fidel Castro in 1977 as the academy for training athletes, has been reflected in the “decrease” of students in the past school cycle. In 2024-2025 there was a reduction of 30,514 students.
Athletes, coaches, circus performers and users have denounced the lack of maintenance of the Eide. The selection of the artistic gymnastics team last June 15 took place in the Ormani Arenado school, where the planks are a minefield from which they have had to pluck pieces of rotten wood. One of the revolutionary emblems inaugurated in 1963 inside the cultural center is in ruins.
The Multipurpose Room 19 de Noviembre in Pinar del Río and the Faculty of Physical Culture Manuel Fajardo (Santa Clara) are also abandoned.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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