Dominican Baseball's False Promises to Players and Families

[Jim Goulart]

 

[biedergb]

Wow that is depressing and worse than I had imagined.  Hard to read the names of players that we follow closely here (Moneys and Fenelon) specifically named.

I do wonder if the academy the brewers have is a help - not beforehand as MLB and the owners and GMs are clearly fine looking the other way - but the despair and depression one could get from being used.  Could the academy help them through what feels like a 'curse'.. Maybe too rose colored glasses that the Brewers are helping these kids out the right way, but certainly that could be an edge, if you can focus on the sport you love and not feel like every future deal is a losing proposition.  Anyway, nice link, good (and long) read, and very sad, but given the state of a lot of the world not surprising ... won't go into any tangents here.

[James Zumstein]

Thank you for sharing this, Jim. I've long suspected that there was a lot of corruption in that part of the baseball world, but I don't think I could have imagined it would ever be that bad. Greed is an awful thing I will never truly understand, and that's how people like this are able to be so successful at swindling people from the money they have. I hope the powers that be can rid this from our great sport we all love so much.

[Jim Goulart]

Via the Journal Sentinel Midweek Podcast: "The Brewers are among the teams that have had a lot of success building talent through its international pipeline, including players like Jackson Chourio and Jesús Made. But the process has its flaws, including predatory lenders who look to take advantage of families promised bonuses years before they're able to officially sign. Gus Garcia-Roberts (9:10), an investigative reporter from ProPublica, traveled to the Dominican Republic to get a sense of what young star ballplayers and their families face in that fraught period between being identified as a talent and signing day. He joined host JR Radcliffe to discuss what he saw, the forces at work and what Major League Baseball could do about it.