Baseball has been America's past time for many many years, but as the popularity has gone down there is still an uprising within the pan-Caribbean area. There is no other country that celebrates Baseball as much and sends as many young players to the Big Leagues as does this area. Although there has been an increase in the amount of young youths that are being recruited and sent to the states, there is a dark side to the recruitment process that is becoming more and more highlighted as the years go on. Although the signing age has been designated to 17 years old there are still individuals that illegally recruit and sign individuals that are under that age. This becomes incredibly unethical and causes a quite inconvenient situation for the players, which could include loss of signing bonus or even termination of a contract if they are found out.
Even worse there are "academies" that are held by individuals that are called buscones and they will harbor young athletes until they are of age and can sign as a free agent. Within these academies they are sometimes housed in poor conditions and they have even been found to be stealing from the young men.The most troubling incidences that have been found within these academies is they have been known to administer illegal PEDs to the athletes in order to get more of a pop off the bat.
It is very disheartening to see older males that are suppose to be supportive figures take advantage of these young players and it is even more embarrassing to the MLB when they are swindled by these investors and scouts that falsify birth certificates and send them players filled with illegal steroids.
At what point will it become enough for the MLB to step in even more than before to put a stop to this? Where is the punishment of these scouts and buscones that take advantage of the boys? Is it right that contracts are terminated when the boys may not even know what is happening?
Amanda Notley
Ruck, R. (2011). Baseball's recruiting abuses. America's Quarterly. Retrieved from http://americasquarterly.org/node/2745
I think this is a tough issue that the MLB really has no control over. Because these academies are in another country and not affiliated with Major League Baseball, I feel that there is nothing the League can do as far as administration or punishment. What the MLB can do is better regulate who comes into their league. If so many players are being chosen out of this particular area, maybe the MLB should send a team of people over there to better understand the type of player that is being grown. By doing this, the MLB will be able to understand what players' real ages are, the drugs they may have taken and the issue that they may have. This is absolutely a baseball rich area, but if players are going to come out of this area with issues that could later get teams in trouble, then there needs to be better research done by the organizations in the MLB.
ReplyDeleteDerek Shay
This issue is very disturbing. Money is the driving force behind it all so regardless of how unethical it might be they'll continue to bend and break the rules. So at what point does it stop? It needs to be be stopped immediately. I'd say it would take enough people to take a stand against it and have enough evidence to prove the accusations. Punishment won't be carried out until it becomes a legal issue and is proved in court, until then the issue isn't being raised, everyone who is aware are keeping quiet because of the money involved. Not only is it wrong that their contracts are terminated but its wrong in the first place that they were given a contract at an age to where they did not understand the Ins and outs.
ReplyDeleteJonathan Robinson