Reds' Eugenio Suárez says Venezuela's 'hope is back' after US attack

GOODYEAR, AZ – Eugenio Suárez was sound asleep at home in Miami when he was awakened before dawn by the repeated buzzing and lighting up of the cell phone near his bed.

Suárez said a lot of people connected to him and his family sent them a lot of information around 2 a.m. in the morning.

“My wife and I woke up and said, ‘What happened?’ “ Suárez said. “And then we saw all the social media, and we found out.”

When he heard that Venezuelan president president Nicolás Madura was out, Eugenio Suarez said, “Oh, man, that’s the best news that we’ve had for a long time.”

Texts from the Suárezes’ home country of Venezuela told the story of military action in Caracas: explosions, fear and chaos, and hope for the best.

By the time they fully awoke that morning of Jan. 3 and sorted out the news, the emotions turned to relief and celebration.

Venezuela’s strong-arm president Nicolás Maduro was out, captured along with his wife by U.S. forces in the quick-strike takeover.

“Oh, man, that’s the best news that we’ve had for a long time,” said Suárez, the Cincinnati Reds slugger, who still keeps a home in his native country. “It’s been tough the last 27 years for us.”

MLB teams and league officials were on high alert in the immediate aftermath of the raid, checking on players and personnel who might be on the ground, possibly in the crosshairs, possibly stranded ahead of scheduled departures to the U.S. for spring training.

Reds president Nick Krall’s staff checked on their people and quickly learned they were in the clear. “We had no issues,” he said.

President Donald Trump’s decision to forcibly remove Maduro was met with criticism and skepticism by some in Congress, including from his own party. Whatever the politics involved and whatever comes next, Suárez echoed what many other Venezuela natives in baseball have expressed privately since the raid: a sense of liberation from the socialist and authoritarian rule of the country that began with Hugo Chávez’s rise to presidential power in 1999 and the eventual transfer to hand-picked successor Maduro in 2013.

“Thanks to the United States for doing that for us,” Suárez said. “We feel so grateful. And we feel so happy. I still have my family there.”

Suárez is among the most prominent Venezuelans in the major leagues, among a group of All-Stars that includes Jose Altuve, of the Houston Astros, and Ronald Acuna Jr., of the Atlanta Braves.

Suárez holds the record for most MLB home runs in a season for a player from Venezuela (49 in 2019 for the Reds and also last year for two teams).

His parents and a sister still live in the Cincinnati area, having moved there when he last played for the Reds and having stayed after his 2022 trade to Seattle.

But a brother and his grandparents are among family still in Venezuela, he said, “and a lot of my friends.”

“As a Venezuelan, that’s big news for us,” Suárez said. “We appreciate everything that the United States is doing for us. That’s huge for us.

“We need them out of our country. And we need a great Venezuela back. We need that.”

When he says “them,” he means the rest of Maduro’s loyalists and allies as well.

“Now we’re waiting for what’s next,” Suárez said. “We already know Maduro’s out. But there’s more people that are still there that we need them out, too. But step by step.”

Suárez was just 8 when Chávez came to power. Most of MLB at the time was still trying to play catch-up to the Houston Astros’ scouting and player development penetration into the country, building their own training academies and minor-league pipelines.

But within a decade of that, the South American country known for beautiful, rich and diverse landscapes, and an economy that supported a strong professional class was becoming more dangerous for many – including players and their families. By the mid-2010s, MLB teams had abandoned their Venezuelan academies and shuttled young Venezuelan prospects to the Dominican Republic academies for development.

If last month’s ousting of Maduro eventually leads to a return of relative stability in Venezuelan leadership and its economy, MLB could be one of the American industries to benefit, possibly including a widespread return of an academy presence in the country.

“I could see that,” Krall said. “There’s a lot of good players in Venezuela. We’ve got a lot of staff members here (from there). You want them to be in a safe environment.”

Suárez at least sees the chance for a return to more freedom and prosperity for many people there.

“I feel our hope is back right now,” he said. “Our hope is back, and we have a really good expectation about how good it’s going to be in Venezuela in a couple years.”

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