The push for increased Spanish translation in Major League Baseball

It’s downright foolish that a billion-dollar industry wouldn't have the financial capacity to hire translators for a massive percentage of their revenue source.

Yet here we are in 2014 and Major League Baseball is in that exact situation.

According to a study conducted by the Society of American Baseball Research in 2013, 26.9 percent of all players in Major League Baseball are Latino, many of whom consider English to be their second language.

Doesn’t it seem odd that almost a third of the players in our nation’s pastime are being overlooked to this day?

Carlos Beltran, proponent for added Spanish translation resources in Major League Baseball.

This issue has come up in the past with players voicing their frustration over this troubling conundrum.

Earlier this year, Michael Pineda of the New York Yankees was ejected from a game and suspended for having an illegal substance (pine tar) on his neck. After that game, the Dominican pitcher spoke with reporters in his broken English rather than his natural Spanish.

He was clearly uncomfortable as he stumbled over the few English words that he had in his limited vocabulary.

The drama came afterwards when his teammate, the prolific Carlos Beltran who grew up in Puerto Rico, angrily brought the topic up to those same reporters.

“It’s a problem because he can’t express himself the way he wants to,” Beltran said. “At the end of the day I know it’s a difficult moment for him as a person.”

Pineda stumbling through his presser after the notorious pine tar incident.

This problem is important because we’re not just talking about some annoying little hitch in the great game of baseball. This is the dismissal of the rights of almost a third of the players in the game.

Perhaps the strangest aspect to this problem is that the Yankees employ three full-time interpreters, all for the Japanese players on their team.

Did I miss something here?

Why do Japanese-speaking players get special treatment when it comes to their manner of communication?

Do Latino-born people have an easier time learning a completely new language?

It baffles me that this is an issue. What baffles me even more is that it can be totally eliminated with one simple solution:

Major League Baseball should be required to hire at least one full-time interpreter for each team. If the players don’t want to use them, they don’t have to. But at least give them the option and resources necessary for them to be able to communicate.

Bruce Chen translating for teammate Yordano Ventura.

After looking through the depth charts of every team in baseball, it is clear that virtually every single one has at least two Latino-born players, most teams with many more.

The number of Spanish-speaking players in baseball has increased steadily over the past 40 years and that trend probably won’t end any time soon.

Baseball is a beautiful game. Everybody should feel welcome, whether that means in the ballpark or in the dugout.

It’s really hard for somebody to feel welcome when they are denied their basic right of communication.