Baseball is everywhere in the Dominican Republic, which sends a disproportionate number of players to the American major and minor leagues, including Hall of Famers like Pedro Martínez and Adrian Beltré.
asserted
which → send → Martínez
Playing fields and training academies dot the country in villages where players who’ve made the leap to the pros are immortalized in murals.
asserted
who → dot → murals
For nearly half a century, the Dominican Republic has sent more players to the majors than any country outside the United States.
asserted
Republic → send → States
The nation, which has a population roughly that of Ohio’s, had 144 players reach the major leagues last year.
asserted
players → have → leagues
That’s about 10% of the league.
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That → ’ → league
The Dominican baseball factory is a volume business, with teams paying signing bonuses to about 450 prospects each year.
asserted
teams → pay → prospects
Fewer than 10% of those young players will ever see a single pitch in the majors, but in a country as impoverished as the Dominican Republic those bonuses — worth several times the country’s average annual income — could be life-changing for the players and their families.
uncertain
bonuses → see → players
Yet Major League Baseball has long allowed a corrosive system to fester that rigs the game against young players in favor of opportunistic trainers and predatory moneylenders.
asserted
that → allow → trainers
Trainers coach children in exchange for future earnings.
asserted
Trainers → coach → earnings
Young baseball players in the United States and Canada must enter the major league system through its annual draft of young prospects.
asserted
players → enter → prospects
But in the Dominican Republic it’s a free-for-all, with players going to the highest bidder.
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players → ’ → bidder
After MLB scouts began to recognize the Dominican Republic as a source of cheap talent, teams opened bare-bones training academies to develop young players.
asserted
teams → begin → players
Eventually, the buscones — men relied on by teams to identify local talent — realized they could start their own academies.
uncertain
they → rely → academies
In addition to coaching, the trainers who operate these academies generally provide room, board and equipment.
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who → operate → room
Education often falls by the wayside.
asserted
Education → fall → wayside
In return, they receive a share — typically 35% to 50% — of a player’s signing bonus.
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they → receive → bonus
Most of those bonuses are valued at around $30,000, but they can be as high as six or seven figures.
asserted
they → value → figures
From 2012 through the beginning of 2026, major league teams paid Dominican prospects $1.042 billion in bonuses, according to a ProPublica analysis.
uncertain
teams → pay → analysis
But much of that money — up to half a billion dollars — is almost immediately siphoned off by trainers and lenders.
asserted
much → siphon → trainers
To get around league rules, MLB teams make handshake deals with underage players.
asserted
teams → get → players
Major league rules bar teams from making official deals with players under the age of 16, but teams have long circumvented this ban through the use of unwritten early agreements, or preacuerdos.
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teams → bar → agreements
In these handshake deals, typically arranged through a player’s trainer, the team pledges to pay a certain amount to the player once he is of legal age to be signed.
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he → arrange → age
With players as young as 11 involved in such deals, it can be years before the prospect receives his bonus.
asserted
prospect → involve → bonus
Moneylenders persuade families to sign over players’ bonuses for high-interest loans.
asserted
Moneylenders → persuade → loans
Preacuerdos and the lure of these promised payouts have created a cottage industry of prestamistas, or moneylenders, who persuade players’ families to sign away portions of these impending bonuses in exchange for loans with sky-high interest rates.
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who → promise → rates
The Dominican Republic repealed its usury laws 24 years ago.
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Republic → repeal → laws
High-interest lenders advertise online, targeting young ballplayers and their families.
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lenders → advertise → ballplayers
One WhatsApp ad touted loans for “baseball players who have agreements.”
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who → tout → agreements
Belfi Rivera was 14 when he made a handshake deal with the Arizona Diamondbacks that would pay him $1.8 million after he turned 16.
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he → make → million
(The Diamondbacks did not respond to a request for comment.)
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Diamondbacks → respond → comment
Ultimately, he’d see very little of that money.
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he → see → money
The trainer who had brokered the deal got his share, worth $630,000.
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who → broker → share
More than $950,000 went to someone who had no hand in teaching Belfi how to play baseball: Santo Caraballo, a lender who formed a business partnership with Red Sox legend and Hall of Famer David Ortiz.
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who → go → Ortiz
In a statement sent through his lawyer, Ortiz said that his business relationship with Caraballo “began to come to an end” more than 18 months ago.”
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relationship → send → end
He added that he ended his personal relationship with Caraballo “a year and a half to two years ago” after “noticing conduct by Mr. Caraballo that I considered inappropriate.
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I → add → Caraballo
I started distancing myself from him personally and placed the relevant matters in the hands of my legal advisors.”
asserted
I → start → advisors
However, in September 2025, Ortiz and Caraballo filmed themselves heading for Puerto Rico on a private jet, drinking and dancing on their way to a Bad Bunny concert.
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themselves → film → concert
In a brief conversation, Caraballo told ProPublica that his business was not the biggest or “that lucrative.”
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business → tell → ProPublica
He added that the risk in loaning money to families is that “you never know if it will succeed or not because if the player doesn’t get signed, you don’t get paid.”
asserted
you → add → families
Multiple attempts were made to reach him again, including sending him a summary of ProPublica’s findings.
asserted
attempts → make → findings
…and 43 more, not listed.
The Aporia
