This is an argument for grace. Please send it to Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred.
One of the most important decisions Commissioner Rob Manfred will make over the course of his career as baseball’s top executive — and the one for which he will be most remembered — is how he punishes Cleveland Guardian pitchers Emmanuel Clase and Luis Ortiz.
Commissioner Manfred: Don’t do the easy thing. Do what teaches the most people about the best course of action. Teach justice and mercy. It’s a big moment. With justice and mercy you can do no wrong.
GUARDIANS PITCHERS INDICATED IN A GAMBLING SCHEME RELATING TO MLB GAMES
To date, the most memorable decision Manfred has made was a terrible one: pulling the All-Star Game from Atlanta in 2021. Manfred’s decision was made in response to Georgia’s then-new election law, which left-wing activists labeled “voter suppression.” (It wasn’t, only absurdist ideologues still claim it was, and we have to assume Manfred really did get terrible advice, since politics isn’t his world.) The All-Star Game and the MLB Draft were moved to Denver that year. It was a truly stupid move, a capitulation to “wokeness,” and one that many serious people will never allow him to make. Team Manfred found out it was a face plant and decided to award Atlanta the 2023 All-Star Game last summer. Good. One error corrected.
Cleveland Guardians pitcher Emmanuel Clase during the Giants game in San Francisco, June 17, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, file)
Manfred also oversaw the introduction of a pitch clock and the rule of placing a runner on second base to start extra innings in the MLB.
Both changes are generally seen as major improvements to the game, but the decision to move the All-Star game from Atlanta has left a mark on Manfred’s reputation for judgment.
Now Manfred has the chance to repair that scar by using excellent judgment.
Both Clase and Ortiz are accused of cheating by deliberately throwing bad single pitches into a game – pitches that are wagered on by the world through so-called ‘prop bets’. The propositions in these cases appear to have been that Clase or Ortiz would not throw a strike on a given pitch. Even a casual fan knows that this is quite easy for a pitcher to guarantee.
So if a pitcher agrees in advance that the first pitch he will throw in a game (or an inning if he expects to pitch more than one inning), gamblers who are “in the know” pile on the money betting on the pitch not being a strike.
Both Clase, 27, and Ortiz, 26, are of course entitled to the presumption of innocence in prosecutions if they do not plead guilty, but the alleged facts do not look good for them. Their federal indictments this month detail how the two allegedly deliberately manipulated individual pitches, benefiting gamblers to the tune of approximately $400,000. It doesn’t appear that either man made much money from the bets, but the facts will come to light.
They are charged with fraud and conspiracy, and Clase and Ortiz each face up to 65 years in prison as a result. Since both are reportedly first-time offenders of a non-violent crime, it is unlikely they will receive a prison sentence, although they could.
Luis Ortiz of the Cleveland Guardians pitches in the first inning of a baseball game against the Minnesota Twins in Cleveland, April 30, 2025. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki, file)
Commissioner Manfred, on the other hand, must decide what to do with the rest of the players’ lives, as well as those of their families. Both players are said to have deliberately thrown terrible pitches, which is obviously cheating. There are more advanced ways to cheat, but this one is the complete proof. It is also remarkably easy to spot irregular betting patterns, causing problems for the gambling industry.
It is not a deception of a refined kind. it’s actually a rather stupid way to cheat, as you’re almost guaranteed to get caught up in the highly sophisticated controls that gambling companies employ.
Most baseball fans are aware of two major precedents when it comes to cheating in baseball.
In 1919, eight players from the Chicago White Sox were accused of throwing that year’s World Series. All eight were charged. All eight were acquitted. But the newly created position of commissioner of baseball had been filled by a hanging judge, Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis, who banned all eight from playing in the majors for life. Wikipedia isn’t exactly a reliable source, but on Monday it said Judge Landis “is remembered for his resolution of the Black Sox scandal, in which he expelled eight members of the Chicago White Sox from organized baseball for conspiring to lose the 1919 World Series and repeatedly denied their reinstatement requests.”
Quickly look at the article for Bart Giamatti while browsing Wikipedia (again, only reliable in rare cases.)
Commissioner Giamatti’s tenure as baseball’s big boss was short-lived. He died of a heart attack five months into his job. But in those five months he did one big thing: “Giamatti’s most notable act as commissioner,” Wikipedia tells us, “was negotiating an agreement that resolved the Pete Rose betting scandal, allowing Rose to voluntarily withdraw from the sport to avoid further punishment.”
Rose’s exile lasted until after the death of “Charlie Hustle” in September 2024. In May 2025, the unnamed custodians of baseball’s Hall of Fame “reinstated” Rose, meaning he may now be eligible for the Hall of Fame in the future. Baseball’s greatest hitter will eventually participate.
It never made much sense to confuse Rose’s off-field behavior with his remarkable record as a player. It would be foolish and a whitewash of the worst kind to continue to ignore Rose’s extraordinary career because he had bet on other teams while managing the Reds.
Baseball has done a good job of fooling Rose. The reason? Usually the ‘integrity of the game’ is denounced, but that is increasingly difficult to say without laughing as sports at every level have chosen to take the money from legalized gambling offers.
Clase and Oritiz are both from the Dominican Republic, which any visitor will note as being home to (1) a high degree of grinding poverty (although not as bad as neighboring Haiti); (2) a trillion baseball diamonds everywhere (3) some extraordinary slums and (4) a distinct entrepreneurial spirit – there are small businesses everywhere.
Emmanuel Clase (left) and Luis Ortiz were charged in a federal gambling investigation on November 9, 2025. (PROPOSE)
Baseball is by far the favorite sport in the Dominican Republic. Commissioner Manfred: Don’t do the easy thing. Do what teaches the most people about the best course of action. Teach justice and mercy. It’s a big moment. With justice and mercy you can do no wrong.
In the Dominican Republic, baseball is almost a religion. For example, baseball is much more popular than football. The DR is also a factory of MLB players, some of whom signed contracts at age 14 or even younger. Fox sports has delved into the incredible pressure on children to make deals. It’s a very poor country and one way to get ahead is baseball.
Once a DR player enters the United States, there will be lectures and guidance at every level of play on the dangers of gambling and the need to choose your friends wisely. But of course, the Cleveland Guardians failed at everything they tried to do when it came to educating young players about the risks gambling poses to them and to the game.
When the time comes to announce his ruling, the first thing Manfred should do is announce that both players will never don a Guardians jersey again and that their contracts are null and void. Cleveland is a well-managed club with great owners, front office staff, managers and coaches. But they completely failed to highlight the sports-killing nature of baseball gambling of any kind, but especially the kind where you deliberately set out to play a terrible game.
So the club has to suffer from its failure. And so should the players.
But what is proportional here? Anyone who says “life ban” is basically saying “ruin their life” because they only have one skill set. These types of fines are disproportionate.
MLB, like the NFL and NBA, has welcomed sports gambling into their revenue streams. The assumption that every game is immersed in betting by millions of gamblers is a given. How can we punish cheaters who abuse their position?
CLICK HERE FOR MORE FOX NEWS ADVICE
The standard answer ‘lifelong ban’ is not the answer. Especially when the players come from a poor country and almost certainly from educational systems not known for excellence. (School is only required until age 14 in the DR, although the DR has both private and public schools.) I don’t know the specifics of Clase or Ortiz’s family structure and status, but their profile probably won’t be that of an MLB draftee coming out of college or a high-profile program for older teens.
What would be an appropriate punishment? Perhaps 90% of their salary in the first year of their sentence goes to MLB for distribution to charities of MLB’s choosing; In year 2, 80% goes to those charities, in year 3 70%, etc. If they stay in the big leagues for another 10 years, they can keep their eleventh annual salary. And, as noted, they must be assigned by the Commissioner to another team not called the Guardians.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
I don’t know if Commissioner Manfred remembers his Shakespeare. But if he does, I hope he remembers Portia’s great grace speech to Shylock in that play:
‘The quality of mercy is not under pressure.
It drops like soft rain from heaven
In the place below. It is blessed twice:
It blesses him who gives and he who takes.
‘It is the mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The enthroned monarch better than his crown.
His scepter shows the power of temporal power,
The mark of awe and majesty
Wherein lies the fear and dread of kings;
But mercy transcends this scepter rule.
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings;
It is an attribute of God Himself;
And the earthly power then shows the similarity to that of God’
Don’t ban them for life, Commissioner Manfred. Make it serious, but don’t let it end your career. Send a message, but not the predictable. This week of Thanksgiving, everyone should be able to remember those who have done good deeds. This time next year, I hope Clase and Ortiz and their families are grateful for a commissioner who was brave enough not to do the obvious.
CLICK HERE TO BY HUGH HEWITT
