WORLD UNIVERSITY GAMES : Cuban Defector’s Dream Is to Pitch in Major Leagues

A Cuban pitcher who fled his team during the World University Games surfaced Monday at a Spanish-language radio station in Miami, saying he had considered defecting for some time and thought about it nightly.

“For months before in training, every night I was thinking about it,” Edilberto Oropesa, 23, said through a translator.

Oropesa, who said he hopes to become a major leaguer, didn’t tell anyone of his plan until Saturday, when he was talking with his cousin through a chain-link fence at Sal Maglie Stadium in Niagara Falls, N.Y., where the Cuban team was about to play a game.

“He told me, ‘I want to stay here,’ ” said the cousin, Leo Landlin. “I told him, ‘How are we going to do this?’ And he goes, ‘I’m going to jump the fence.’

“I told him, ‘You can’t jump the fence. Look how high it is!’ It was like 10 or 12 feet high.”

Oropesa completed the story.

“My cousin was telling me to go around to the shorter fence,” he said. “I told him, ‘No way! I’m jumping right here.’ I jumped the fence and we hauled butt.”

The pitcher ran to a waiting car, which sped off.

Oropesa will seek asylum in the United States.

He said his role model is fellow Cuban pitcher Rene Arocha of the St. Louis Cardinals. Oropesa left his team two years to the day Arocha defected in Miami.

“It’s the dream of every Cuban ballplayer to make it to the big leagues,” Oropesa said.

In competition, Richard Scott of Kansas scored 21 points as the U.S. men’s basketball team improved its record to 3-0 with a 93-64 over Ireland. The U.S. women’s basketball team used a late run to defeat Russia, 72-55, and improve its record to 4-0.