Cuban Baseball Star Gourriel Returns after Great Performance in Japan

HAVANA, Cuba, Oct 14 (acn) After successfully playing in Japan Professional Baseball League, the star player Yulieski Gourriel is already in Cuba to, after a break, play with the Havana Industriales in Cuban National Baseball Series.

Upon arrival on Monday to Havana, Gourriel described his passing through the Japanese baseball circuit as an unforgettable experience, but he acknowledged that he returned very tired after having been enrolled for the first time in a demanding championship, Radio Havana Cuba reported on its website.

The member of Cuban national team to three World Baseball Classics rated as extremely exhausting the training system implemented in Japanese baseball, and added that the next Cuban players to be enrolled in that competition should be previously adapted to such intensity.

Yulieski Gourriel claimed to have met his main expectation in the called Japanese Major Leagues as in 62 games for the Yokohama DeNA Baystars he had an average of .305, including 73 hits in 239 at bats, and he totaled 46 runs, 30 RBIs, 22 doubles and 11 homers.

The stellar players Yulieski Gourriel, Frederich Cepeda and Alfredo Despaigne, along with the young pitcher Hector Manuel Mendoza, participated this season in Japanese baseball circuit as part of the policy of the Cuban Federation of that discipline of inserting its players in foreign competitions.