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INSIDE 10 THE TRUTH Baseball’s dwindling black talent base. By Howard Bryant 12 ZOOM Hockey’s outdoor mecca, brought to you by another frigid Minnesota winter. 14 ZOOM The world’s most elaborate free-throw-distracting mechanism ever invented. 84 THE FIX Perfection is a lot to demand, even from our heroes. By Chris Jones
Action sports are never far away in Cuba, as Yojany Perez shows in Havana’s Plaza de la Revolucion.
PLAYBOOK 17 SKIING Drama is certain to follow Bode Miller as he chases Olympic medal No. 6 in Sochi. 22 HOCKEY Warroad, Minn., again finds itself at the epicenter of Team USA's medal hopes. 24 NBA Five hoops junkies fix the failing All-Star Game. 26 COLLECTION Tennis ball containers that break the mold. 28 MOTORSPORTS NASCAR has tweaked the Chase again, but are changes meant to stall JJ?
30 COLLEGE BASKETBALL Why gimpy Sparty will be a title favorite when healthy. 32 SOCCER Messi’s dazzling Champions League dominance.
DON’T MISS 34 OUT ROUTE Inside Tony Gonzalez’s final season as his career-long chase for a ring came to an all-too-familiar end. By Seth Wickersham
cover photograph by ERIC RAY DAVIDSON; logo by DAN CASSARO WARDROBE STYLING BY COURTNEY DION MAYS; GROOMING BY BLAKE; TEE: DODGERS ( MAJESTIC THREADS ) ; HAT: POPULAR DEMAND; BRACELET: DAVID YURMAN; WATCH: KENNETH COLE; THIS PAGE: ADAM WISEMAN
43 THE CUBA ISSUE Yes, that tiny island off the coast of Florida is sports’ NEXT great pipeline. 44 THE WATER’S EDGE Why the decision to defect is never as easy as it seems. By Dan Le Batard 46 WHAT’S NEXT FOR YASIEL PUIG? Puig is already a phenomenal talent, but can he help transform baseball? By Tim Keown 57 “CUBA HAS TO BUDGE” Antonio Castro: “I think our players who trained here earned the right to go play in other leagues.” By Paula Lavigne
60 A WORLD OF HIS OWN Aroldis Chapman earned a $30 million ticket out of Cuba, but he still yearns for the life he left behind. By Eli Saslow 68 UPRISING Cuba’s cluster of skaters, surfers and BMXers are united by an affinity for their craft. By Eric Nusbaum 76 THIS WAY OUT The high-priced underground economy of smuggling champion boxers. By Peter Keating and Brin-Jonathan Butler
02/17/2014 ESPN The Magazine
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