This is a little outside of my area of expertise, but I’ll have a go. Baseball’s popularity in Cuba and other places in the Caribbean predates the arrival of American troops by almost thirty years. The roots of its popularity lie more in its colonial experience under Spanish control. The first individuals to bring the game out of the States were the sons of Cuban and Puerto Rican elite, who went to the United States to study as early as the late 1860s and 1870s. According to Adrian Burgos in Playing America’s Game: Baseball, Latinos, and the Color Line, “this generation acted as the vanguard of Cuban baseball, teaching others how to play the game and forming baseball clubs that laid the foundation for the game’s development” (20). Cuban sugar planters who fled Cuba’s political and economic turbulence during the 1870s brought the game to the Dominican Republic. Following this initial encounter, baseball clubs and leagues sprang up both in the Caribbean and also in Cuban, Dominican, and Puerto Rican communities in the United States.

Baseball had particular appeal in the political and social climate of time period, which helped it gain popularity. The game had perceived cultural value to those colonies still under Spanish rule. The famous article “Between Baseball and Bullfighting: The Quest for Nationality in Cuba” by Louis Perez (it is available online if you run a quick Google search) argues that baseball was especially appealing because it represented a cultural and nationalistic movement among Cubans. By playing baseball, they rejected the backwards and inhumane sport of the Spaniards (bullfighting) in favor of the equality and progressivism of America’s game. Baseball was viewed as a liberating game that taught personal improvement within a community/team environment. In this way, the player improved himself and his team/community at the same time, a much more “civilized” activity than the “barbaric” slaughter of a bull. The quote from a Cuban newspaper that Perez uses to start the article is particularly valuable: “Baseball...has contributed much to redeeming us from such degrading spectacles [as bullfights], absorbing the attention of our excitable youth, who, through such a useful pastime, experience an awakening of their intelligence and at the same time acquire a healthy physical development” (493).

Baseball became even more popular as stars from the Caribbean had opportunities to play in American leagues or against American teams. This relationship was extremely complicated due the imperial relationships of Caribbean islands to the United States and the racial environment prevalent in Jim Crow America (as Burgos convincingly demonstrates). The elite continued to play the game, but so too did city dwellers, newly freed slaves, and farm workers. Meanwhile, emigrant communities continued to grow in the States, where Caribbean and American cultures mixed and spread. By the time of the Spanish-American War, baseball was firmly entrenched in many Caribbean societies. American soldiers and government officials during military interventions often saw baseball as a key “in” to develop further American values, so they encouraged communities to play the game.

The prevalence of the game allowed Cuban, Dominican, and Puerto Rican migrants to maintain social and cultural ties, even far from home. For example, according to in Puerto Rican Nation on the Move, Puerto Rican immigrants formed various social clubs to look after new immigrants, which often included baseball teams and leagues to bring their community together. New York City alone had 190 Puerto Rican teams by the mid-twentieth century (191). As Major League Baseball rose to dominance in the latter half of the twentieth century, money also became a motivating factor to play baseball. The MLB and its sponsors invested abroad to grow the game. In the Dominican Republic for example, players embraced baseball as an opportunity to better their community. In Alan Klein’s Growing the Game: The Globalization of Major League Baseball, the author explains that “poverty drives the best talent in the direction of a baseball career as one of the few hopes of escape [from it]” (92). Baseball provided economic opportunity for some who might not have had any other prospects.

I can’t speak for why soccer didn’t become as popular. From a historian’s perspective, it is usually impossible to explain why something didn’t happen. However, baseball’s hold in these places stems from the cultural and social dynamics of the late 1800s and early 1900s. The game captured the attention of many people in different ways, taking on unique meanings for each community who played and watched it.