Day 3: Major League Baseball

Today I took a half hour bus into Santo Domingo to meet with Aaron Rodriguez, the Baseball Operations Assistant for Major League Baseball in the Dominican Republic. It was an informative interview and gave me some perspective as I prepare to visit a multitude of academies in the coming days.

MLB's Santo Domingo office, which opened in 2000, was the first international office to be established, largely in response to a growing concern for the state of baseball in the country. A lot of literature I've read castigated Major League teams for providing subpar facilities to their Latin players, treating them as cash-crops, rather than human beings (A novel, "Stealing Lives" details the life of a Cubs prospect in haunting detail, comparing his summer experience in the DR to Vietnam, as he lived in a former brothel and received no treatment for a horrific injury). Thus, one of the office's main objectives is to regulate the conditions of the academies. It seems to have worked fairly well; all of the academies I have visited have been very nice; players receive free room and board, have relatively comfortable rooms, and receive some form of an education. The office also looks to enhance the League's image throughout Latin America.

As far as community outreach programs go, Aaron emphasized that despite these regulations, each team acts as its own company. MLB does not require them to do any outreach, and he can only name about three examples of active teams (two of which I provided myself). This was a little disappointing, but makes sense. It means that if teams become serious about providing sustainable community programs, they must see how it can best beneift their interests as a company (image, good relations with the community, etc).

He also talked extensively about education. MLB requires that every team provides five hours of English classes per week to each player. Just from a few visits to academies, I know that this doesn't happen; most teams provide very sporadic classes, and there is no formal curriculum. This would be something interesting to further investigate.

As far as baseball's larger economic impact in the country, Aaron estimated that in this past signing cycle, players were promised a total of 50-60 million dollars just in signing bonuses. That's obviously a lot, especially for this country, and a lot of it is invested into the local economy.

As a common theme, Aaron emphasized what a big deal baseball is in this country. He noted that the DR is made up of 2 P's, el politico y la pelota (baseball). Again, it's easy to see the potential for baseball as a tool for community change in this country. It was a little frustrating that MLB mostly supervises the academies, and does not actively encourage them to provide education or community programs, but that's something I can address in a paper.

The rest of the day I spent traveling to other academies (Rockies, Indians, Blue Jays, Marlins) and making appoitnments. I'm getting to be pretty good friends with the cab drivers, who are both avid fans that have had family members signed into the academies. As an aside, one of them knew the guard at the Marlins facility, who excitedly noted that his son was just signed by the Giants for $100,000. The cab driver was astonished that the guard continued to work, rather than just living off his son.

Tomorrow, I'll be visiting the San Diego Padres academy, which everyone has told me is the best in the country. They also recently reconstructed a school, so I will check that out, and hopefully be able to use that as a model for a successful community program. I must say though, that after just three days of visits and interviews, I'm understanding the role of MLB in the DR a lot more clearly, which I feel is very important to concretely understand how community programs can play a positive role through the lens of the academy.