A grand jury has been convened as part of a federal investigation into Latin American amateur signings by Major League Baseball clubs, according to a report from Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports. It’s a notable development in a segment of the baseball labor market long noted for its shadowy dealings.
Full details are not yet known. As Passan explains in this must-read article, however, the potential scope of the investigation is vast. After all, ballplayers from Latin American nations — in particular, the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, and Cuba — make up a significant portion of the game’s talent base. For decades, they have signed as teenagers under an obscure, largely unregulated system.
So-called “buscones” — alternatively framed as “trainers” or “finders” of young talent — play a notable role in the scheme. Characterizing them, though, quickly becomes complicated: root cause or symptom of systematic issues? scourge or part of the solution? There are differing perspectives, both on the system as a whole and the individuals involved.
A recently initiated MLB clean-up effort notably seeks to bring buscones into the process more formally. Of course, they don’t exist in a vacuum. The broad grey area in which they interact with representatives of MLB organizations and player agents is where the business of Latin American baseball occurs. Millions upon millions of dollars change hands in that foggy world, with some of the game’s brightest future stars emerging in one of thirty uniforms.
So, where’s the focus here? Passan writes that the specific “target of the inquiry” is not yet fully certain. But it seems that the 2015 signing of Cuban infielder Hector Olivera by the Dodgers is at least one area of interest, with a “former Atlanta Braves official” (the organization acquired Olivera later that year) and certain unnamed “people involved with the signing” receiving subpoenas.
Olivera received a hefty $28MM signing bonus as part of a $62.5MM total guarantee. Of course, he was excluded from the much more restricting parameters that govern the signings of younger players. The rules — as recently amended — create a hard cap on the amount of total bonuses each MLB team can dole out in a given year.
Whether the Olivera situation is of singular interest or just one element of the inquiry isn’t quite clear. But there’s little question that the duration and breadth of the Latin American signing game offers quite a few more potential targets to investigate. An array of club officials and agency personnel have certainly been involved over the years, with untold numbers of middle men and peripheral figures in addition to the well-known buscones.
Even more broadly, Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association have undeniable roles in all of this. Whether foreign governmental officials could be involved, potentially raising the stakes, isn’t know, though Passan notes that the matter involves Justice Department attorneys who prosecute actions under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
It’s not yet known how the investigation will proceed, where it will reach, and what the potential and actual consequences will be. As Passan writes, though, it has “spooked” the “top officials on both sides” — that is, the league and the union. And it’s amply arguable that a full accounting of MLB’s involvement in Latin America is warranted.
Send in ICE!
Make baseball great again!
Jk
You’ve been hanging around Xabial too much
I chuckled at this comment
Fellas don’t be bullies.
Say whatever you’d like and whatever you want. Baseball is Baseball. Stop being sensitive. Ill take a 12mph diss from the lips than an 92mph heater from the hand any day of the week.
You’ve been a douche too much, MYRS. Random name drop posters are scum. thought we were good, what happened bucket jockey?
Muckraker
JK
It’s all Trumpbama’s fault.
Cartereagabusclintobushbamump’s fault
Make them eligible for the draft..
Problem solved.
Make them wait until they are 18 and include them in the regular draft.
100% correct. I’ve also been saying that for years here. Only way to get those criminal buscones out, forged ID’s, birth certificates and other identification papers out and put all amateur players under a certain age under 1 system.
It makes -0- sense having it like this when it’s positively known how fraudulent one of the systems (Caribbean ifa) is rife with and it needs to stop now. I hope the government burns MLB big time over this.
Yes because forged IDs never say they are 18yrs old.
Let the organizations, players and whoever represent them make their own call. Regulation also means restrictions. Turning this into a court battle is taking it too far.
They really need to do something about this. Multi million dollar franchises shouldn’t be negotiating deals with 14 year olds
I’m not trying to be a smart ass, but why not?
It’s a fair question, but the crux of that is (as is this investigation, it seems) the question of whether these kids are receiving honest representation/competent representation and if they are getting a fair shake on these deals as opposed of having grifters siphon off a disproportionate amount of money. It’s tough to argue that many of these kids or their families are qualified to make that judgement.
Who are we protecting here? The 14 year olds? So you are saying that they should be kept in poverty and not be able to sign contracts until they are much older? The reaction to that would likely be that they will sign over tons of their future earnings to someone in order to feed themselves and their familys while they train until they are old enough to sign a contract
Maybe put a cap on the amount they can sign for, while putting a percentage of that money into a trust fund that can’t be touched until they turn a certain age. That way it doesn’t get blown all at once.
They should say that if you are 16-22 you enter the draft 23+ is a free agent
“Former Atlanta Braves official”
Guess Coppolella didn’t want to go down alone.
One thing we probably know for sure…there are no Baltimore Orioles personnel involved.
LOL. Maybe the Orioles abstained for ethical reasons?
shut the comments down. This guy wins
Get on with the international draft. That’s the only way things are going to change
As many have said already. Just put everyone in a draft. Problem solved.
Just a general response to everyone saying ‘throw them into the draft pool’ : there is no organized baseball for these teenagers after they age out of little league. No high school league, no college leagues… You treat them like American players, they all go ay soccer instead because they have no prayer of getting drafted high enough to make it worth their time. No team is drafting a player years behind his American counter parts in the first 10 rounds
You force a draft, the talent pipeline from Latin America dries up overnight
That is why organizations should be allowed to sign any player they want. Let the buyer beware. For every Vlad Jr there is a Yasmany Tomas. If a team signs a 19-year old thinking he’s 16, so be it. That is the risk you take.
Personally I think the problem can be mostly solved by insisting all the ‘buscones’ just get accredited like American agents, and only allowing teams to do business with the ones MLB finds credible. One of the big problems with the market is there’s no reason for these trainer/agents not to deal under the table, they lose nothing even if they get caught
Make it so can lose basically everything and I bet the system gets much more transparent fast
Which is why people talk about an mlb-funded “academy” system that would give them organized ball to play in that age bracket and help regulate their entry into the league. Eventually there could be several ways to have them enter the league whether it’s a draft or a signing system that’s equitable for all 30 teams but can allow the top talent to get paid a lot closer to their value than the current system.
Which is a proposal that’s dead on arrival because the big market teams are never going to agree to fund a system that funnels all the best talent largely to whoever decides to tank that year
And the countries involved would never go for it because their citizens are the ones losing the ig signing bonuses for absolutely no benefit to them. You take away the open bidding system and the players have no leverage anymore because their choice basically becomes take whatever’s offered on become a day laborer until they’re 25… Good luck selling that to a baseball federation.
The only people who benefit from this idea is mlbs pr department. Pretty much everyone else gets screwed.
The problem never was the system itself, it was the laughably poor oversight of the system. The players involved make more money, as well as get better training and an education, and every team has an equal chance to sign the best players. So why not try just letting the system work as intended with proper oversight?
I don’t disagree with the sentiment, but I’m curious to see how the US Justice Department has any role in people cheating the MLB International Free Agency rules. Only thing I can think is bribing officials of foreign governments. Shady handlers on foreign taking a commission against the MLB CBA doesn’t seem to fall under the purview of the US Government.
Beyond involvement of foreign officials, it is imaginable — totally hypothesizing here — that bank or tax fraud types of things could be implicated. Wouldn’t be directly about enforcing MLB rules, but what might have been done wrong as a means of facilitating the evasion of those rules. This is pure speculation on my behalf, though.
Actually the Justice Department does have that authority. Any U.S. entity registered in one of the fifty states or a foreign registered entity operating in the United States falls under Justice Department jurisdiction. If the Justice Department believes that entity is engaged in behavior that violates United States criminal or civil statutes or is in violation of federal rules governing that entity or its operations, it can investigate.
Please educate me, because the answer to this seems awfully obvious from my perspective.
Create a MLB youth academy for promising kids 13 and up. Offer housing, nutrition and schooling to the kids
Have the local gov’s regulate education requirements and housing and nutrition rules.
When the kids have both reached the age of 18 and passed their education requirements they become draft eligible to all teams, in a separate, international draft with a separate international pool.
I was going to post something similar to the guy above who questioned putting them into the draft.
Because such an arrangement means convincing all the teams to pay for the development of players only one team reaps the benefits of. All MLB programs are funded by the member teams
Imagine trying to convince the Yankees (for example) to foot part of the bill of developing the next Vlad Jr. Only so some team can tank just to get him on the cheap… And now you know why it’ll never happen
I mean you can fiddle with the amount each team pays. Have a lottery where the picks are randomly chosen, and then where you pick decides how much you pay.
Individual teams do this already nearly year around as it is and then run the DSL league during the summer, some teams have enough signed players to sport 2 teams, why the funds cannot be “forced” from every team in the league, rather than about half which run so called academies in the Dominican Republic and open such “camps” in other prospective countries for kids is beyond me. That has always been the answer to those criminal buscones.
I understand the next biggest hotbed of talent Venezuela might be a problem at the moment with it’s current political problems in opening one, but it would be the obvious choice to look at for MLB in desperate need along the lines of what many teams have accomplished in Dominica with feeding and housing youngsters.
Just get all the teams to pay the way instead and then a draft, take it from the money the lower teams get as charity even, then raise the amount those same get in the new draft. Has to be a way to make it all work.
It’s nowhere near as simple as that. It never has and it never will be. I’m all for a draft, but the caveat is mlb funneling money into infrastructure and educational endeavors. There is no high school, college, or organized baseball system so it’s nothing like the US. In fact so much of this is regional and there are absolutely still major ethical issues not addressed by a draft. Quite simply the main difference between American born players and many international teenagers is recourse. Until you provide a legitimate option for Latin American players to be able to walk away from a situation it’s a crock. You’re cutting their legs from under them even with the little leverage they have now in support of billionaire owners who would like you to believe they are right and moral. We’ve already seen MLB owners act in their own interest so there’d be no doubt that they would absolutely relish the idea of drafting players who have no other form of recourse. Players signing upon their own accord and being able to negotiate is basically their only leverage in this situation. Not to mention the regional effect of academies and the nature of Latin America. In reality buscones are basically a needed life line for so many players. MLB really needs to find a way to regulate buscones. It’s been my experience that many think a draft system is an end all be all situation, yet have no understanding of the crucial intricacies involved. Not only that, but understanding that a one draft system severely severely hurts domestic players more than they can comprehend.
I get your point, but also remember nearly 40y ago when we’d have shore leave on some of those Caribbean islands that we’d see the kids playing stick ball, even baseball with something, anything and some had equipment that had probably been given them prior and were using bits and pieces.
Am sure it’s much better now as have mentioned here before and the game is popular. I don’t see buscones as necessary to anything. MLB can take over some of the larger DSL camps, continue giving out equipment. It’s not that difficult if one thinks about it. I also think the game itself should have it’s own scouting network to employ out of work ones to get to the streets and must be native former players of said country as recruiters.Get future potential players into these camps and off the streets.
Will it cost? Yes, I think it would, especially startup money where there is no infrastructure yet, like in Venezuela, but look at the massive amount of tv revenue coming in, then the so called profit sharing some teams get. The money is there.
I think you’re discussing more so established teenagers that are close to signing contracts. I’m discussing more so the role buscones play in helping youth. Not everything buscones do is shady although some of it can definitely cross that line. And clearly not ever buscone is dirty. Which is why there needs to be regulation. Unless you provide the framework of what they do for the youth then I’m not sure you can say they aren’t necessary. We are talking about housing youth, providing equipment, providing transportation, aka essentially what youth parents are able to provide their children in terms of travel ball and the amateur circuit in established countries. It so much more intertwined then one may be willing to admit or understand. So sure if you’re creating complete infrastructure and transportation or living quarters across the entire countries then sure, but poverty is rampant and the quest to help family and get out of poverty extends beyond belief. And the role of buscones is essentially vital.
This will be the beginning of the end for AJ Preller. Two of the three disciplinary actions he received from MLB were due to his unethical actions with young Latin players.
So the MLB/Braves scapegoated Coppoella, gave him the “Death Penalty”, and let his bosses quietly resign/retire (one into the baseball hall of fame), and now are riding his rebuild into the playoffs. Im sure he knew just where to point investigators. Just as Frank Wren knew where to point mlb to when he got the axe. Airing dirty laundry out after getting the axe is bad form, not that i blame coppy.
Elaborate on Wren. What did he point MLB to? I don’t remember that.
Wasting more taxpayer money on a sport. They sure do love spending money on b.s.
And that’s a new thing?
Hehe, love the international draft idea. Not like it’s impossible or anything.