Tucapita Marcano wasn’t the only MLB player caught violating the league’s sports betting policy.
Former Pittsburgh Pirates and San Diego Padres player Tucapita Marcano has received a lifetime ban from MLB for violating the league’s sports betting policy. Per ESPN’s Jeff Passan, Marcano won just 4.3 percent of the bets he made on baseball, gambling $150,000 worth of earnings as well.
MLB announced suspensions for Marcano and four other players on Tuesday morning. The following comments, made my Manfred, leave little doubt how serious MLB is about its gambling policies.
“The strict enforcement of Major League Baseball’s rules and policies governing gambling conduct is a critical component of upholding our most important priority: protecting the integrity of our games for the fans,” Manfred said. “We have been clear that the privilege of playing in baseball comes with a responsibility to refrain from engaging in certain types of behavior that are legal for other people.”
The four other players punished — A’s RHP Michael Kelly, Padres LHP Jay Groome, Phillies INF José Rodríguez and Diamondbacks LHP Andrew Saalfrank — were all suspended for one year, rather than the lifetime ban Marcano received.
MLB reveals Tucapita Marcano’s gambling habits
MLB went in detail regarding Marcano’s gambling, specifically on baseball, to show he had little to no impact on the games themselves. Marcano placed placed 387 baseball bets, “including 231 MLB-related bets among other bets on international baseball games through a legal sportsbook.”
“In total, Marcano bet more than $150,000 on baseball, with $87,319 of that on MLB-related bets (an average of approximately $378 per bet). Of the over 200 MLB bets Marcano placed over this period, 25 of those bets included Pirates games while he was assigned to the Pirates’ Major League Club,” MLB’s statement read.
It should be noted that Marcano did not appear in the vast majority of games he bet on, as he was recovering from a season-ending knee injury at the time. Marcano only won 4.3 percent of his bets and lost every parlay in which the Pirates were featured. Most importantly, Marcano denies that he impacted the end result of any games he gambled on.
MLB’s gambling policy has a few holes
It’s tough for Manfred to act all high and mighty when the league he oversees has official gambling partners and encourages fans to place bets at every turn. If anything, MLB should consider itself lucky that Marcano — a player of very little significance — is who they must make an example of. This suspension comes just months after the Ippei Mizuhara scandal, in which Shohei Ohtani’s former interpreter stole millions from him to pay off an illegal bookie.
This will not be MLB’s last gambling scandal, especially as they continue to take money from legal sportsbooks around the country and beyond.
