Bryan Green, CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Rob Ruck is an important voice on issues within the Dominican academy system as it exists with the MLB. He is the author of the 1999 book ‘The Tropic of Baseball’ which explains the MLB’s role in emerging political and social situations in the Dominican Republic. In this piece for The Conversation, which prides itself on its ‘academic rigor’ but ‘journalistic flair,’ Ruck uses his work on the subject to introduce the concepts of the academy system as well as the exploitation of the Dominican Republic by the MLB. It’s the product of a partnership between The Conversation and the University of Pittsburgh, where Ruck is a history professor.
He argues that the intense commercialization and investment by the MLB has created complex systems designed to manipulate players as well as the MLB itself. Buscones, people who find young Dominican players to sell to Major League scouts, are another aspect of this issue. Emphasizing profit over ethical concerns – especially for somewhere like the Dominican Republic where the baseball pipeline may appear closer because of the League’s presence on the island – continues to be a trend in how the MLB and Dominican Republic interact.
Klein doubts that most teams, despite the hype over education, really care. “They’re in the business of fabricating talent, and their interests are short term. It’s been that way for the past 25 years,” he said. Given how much Major League Baseball has benefited from the labor of Latino players, surely it could do more. The league could start by funding a study to investigate what happens to those whose careers fizzle out before making it to an academy and find ways to invest in their lives and communities. Those investments wouldn’t produce ballplayers or enhance clubs’ bottom lines. But it would pay back some of the social debt the league has incurred in the Caribbean.
Ruck, Rob. “The promise and peril of the Dominican baseball pipeline.” The Conversation. March 25, 2019.
Ruck, Rob. n.d. “The Promise and Peril of the Dominican Baseball Pipeline.” The Conversation. Accessed December 13, 2022. http://theconversation.com/the-promise-and-peril-of-the-dominican-baseball-pipeline-113242.