FBI Investigation into MLB Scouting Still Ongoing

The FBI continues its investigation into Major League Baseball’s Dominican Republic scouting programs. The whole thing is bound to get messier, so I want to establish a timeline now before there are simply too many conflicting stories to straighten out. Basically, for the past year, the feds have been investigating the skimming of bonuses from Latin American prospects by MLB personnel. Here’s how it’s gone down:

July 2, 2006: The Washington Nationals sign sixteen-year-old Dominican shortstop Esmailyn Gonzalez to a $1.4m signing bonus. Gonzalez is discovered by Nationals special assistant (and former World Series MVP) Jose Rijo. After signing, Gonzalez makes it clear he wanted to sign with the Nationals because of Rijo.

May 16, 2008: The Chicago White Sox fire scouting director Dave Wilder when they discover he is under investigation by the FBI for skimming off bonuses paid to Dominican Republic prospects.

July 14, 2008: ESPN reports that Washington Nationals general manager Jim Bowden and special assistant Jose Rijo are under investigation for their roles in the ongoing scandal surrounding the signing of Dominican Republic players. Bowden and Rijo deny any wrongdoing. (The relationship between Bowden, Rijo, and the Domincan Republic dates to the late 1990s and early 2000s when Bowden was GM of the Cincinnati Reds. He used Rijo’s training facility to cultivate talent for the Reds’ organization.)

Aug 5, 2008: The New York Times reports several New York Yankees scouts have been placed on leave pending an investigation by the FBI into their Latin American scouting practices. Six to eight teams are reportedly under investigation.

Aug 16, 2008: The New York Yankees fire two scouts who reportedly took kickbacks from Dominican players they helped sign. The Yankee employees are identified as director of Latin American scouting Carlos Rios and Ramon Valdivia, the team’s Dominican Republic scouting director.

Feb 17, 2009: Esmailyn Gonzalez reveals that he falsified identification papers and is not (by now) nineteen years old, but actually twenty-three years old. Oh, and his name is actually Carlos Alvarez Daniel Lugo.

Feb, 26, 2009: Jose Rijo is fired.

Mar 1, 2009: Jim Bowden resigns.

Mar 30, 2009: ESPN’s Peter Gammons reports that MLB commissioner Bud Selig has given MLB security an open checkbook to try and clean up the mess in the Dominican Republic. Possibly as many as 70 prospects—some "big names" apparently—are being detained while the government sorts through the plethora of potentially-falsified names, birth certificates, etc.

So what are people saying? ESPN The Magazine's Jorge Arangure Jr. lists six ways to fix Dominican Republic baseball. The Magazine also ran a nice feature recently on what it's like to be a prospect in the DR.

It's clear to me, anyway, that no matter the problems, the system as it stands now is ruthlessly efficient at one thing: churning out MLB-caliber ballplayers. How we protect those ballplayers is the question.