Usually, before a player is ready and primed to be an impact player at the MLB level, they will spend a few years on the bus, honing their craft in the minor leagues. This is a great way for young players to get acclimated from playing college (or even high school) ball to playing against grown men who are all at the absolute pinnacle of the game. Wander Franco is only 22 years old, and spent some time in 2021 as the youngest player in the MLB (and is still the 8th youngest now), so he has spent a noticeably small amount of time in the minors compared to his contemporaries.
Or so we thought.
Apparently Wander has been playing in the minors way more than anybody should (the standard is set at “not at all”, by the way. Here at A2Z, we hold a firm stance against pedophilia, and we plan on keeping that stance. Notice how other outlets, such as ESPN, have not released their anti-pedo stances. Curious…).
No bueno, Señor Franco.
Franco is accused of having an inappropriate (presumably romantic/sexual) relationship with a 14 year old. That is bad. Imagine yourself at 14. You’re barely a freshman in high school at the latest. You’re likely still in middle school. And while I’m sure 14 year old me thought he was ready to participate in some X-rated activities with Megan Fox after watching the car scene Transformers for the millionth time, 14 year olds are still children and unequivocally should not have romantic involvements with adults. Even worse, this situation may be more widespread than it seemed for Franco.
Obviously this is a sensitive situation, and the investigation is ongoing, so there is a chance that this is all just a big misunderstanding. Innocent until proven guilty – the cornerstone of our justice system. But come on. This is not looking good for the young Dominican.
I also decided to look up the age of consent in the Dominican Republic, just in case there’s different messed-up rules there that he may be operating under or something like that. Nope. The Dominican Republic has the age of consent at 18. He’s playing in a league of his own (little league).
I have no interest now in going deep into what this means in terms of baseball and on-field performance. Wander Franco is a great baseball player, and assuming he is not allowed to return to action (baseball action, not middle school dance action), the Rays will likely miss his production. They may suffer a bit in an excellent AL East, but they could certainly make the playoffs without him, as they are still a talented, strategically sound team. They may want to avoid playing small ball, though, if you catch my drift.
If the accusations leveled against Franco are true, he needs to be out of baseball and face criminal charges. The situation needs to be handled with a real degree of seriousness.
This does not mean I have to be serious, however. As long as the severity is understood, the content coming out of this situation has been pretty hilarious, so I will round this out by sharing some of my favorite posts about the whole ordeal.
Don’t fret, Wander; they might have wiffleball in prison.