Major League Baseball teams are likely to make one big change in the wake of the gambling scandal that ensnared Ippei Mizuhara.
In an appearance on the “Foul Territory” podcast, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic suggested that teams will be much more careful going forward in vetting figures like interpreters for players. Rosenthal notes that there were a number of holes in Mizuhara’s biography that should have been caught when the Los Angeles Angels hired Mizuhara to translate for Shohei Ohtani.
"@SamBlum3 of @TheAthletic has written that there are inaccuracies in Ippei's biography that probably should have been caught…"@Ken_Rosenthal says that teams will step up their background checks on key personnel like interpreters.
▶️ https://t.co/JeoPraNZJs pic.twitter.com/kHmKNfIL4A
— Foul Territory (@FoulTerritoryTV) April 12, 2024
“I am certain, and have talked to some people in the game, about what they will do going forward. Yes, background checks. Yes, I would imagine the next time an interpreter is presented to a team, they’re going to have more questions than maybe the Angels did about Ippei,” Rosenthal said. “I would expect there to be an effect here, and an impact on the way teams conduct themselves in the future. Maybe even guidelines that MLB puts in place for interpreters in the future, how they are given their roles and all of those kinds of things.”
Rosenthal is correct about inconsistencies in Mizuhara’s biography. Those would have been caught with a more thorough background check, but the Angels, who hired Mizuhara to work with Ohtani, likely did not feel that was necessary. Expect that to change going forward.
Mizuhara is facing charges of bank fraud after allegedly stealing upwards of $16 million from Ohtani in order to pay off gambling debts.
