CHICAGO — White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen thinks Asian players are given privileges in the United States that Latinos are not afforded.
The outspoken Guillen also said he’s the “only one” in baseball teaching young players from Latin America to stay away from performance-enhancing drugs and that Major League Baseball doesn’t care about that.
He said MLB only cares about how often he argues with umpires and what he says to the media.
Guillen said it’s unfair that Japanese players are assigned translators but Latinos are not.
“Very bad. I say, why do we have Japanese interpreters and we don’t have a Spanish one? I always say that. Why do they have that privilege and we don’t?” Guillen said Sunday.
“Don’t take this wrong, but they take advantage of us. We bring a Japanese player, and they are very good and they bring all these privileges to them. We bring a Dominican kid . . . go to the minor leagues, good luck. Good luck. And it’s always going to be like that. It’s never going to change. But that’s the way it is.”
Guillen, who is from Venezuela, said when he went to see his son, Oney, in Single-A, the team had a translator for a Korean prospect who “made more money than the players.”
“And we had 17 Latinos, and you know who the interpreter was? Oney. Why is that? Because we have Latino coaches? Because here he is? Why? I don’t have the answer,” Guillen said. “We’re in the United States; we don’t have to bring any coaches that speak Spanish to help anybody. You choose to come to this country and you better speak English.
“It’s just not the White Sox, it’s baseball,” he added.
Guillen said young prospects in Latin America are being influenced to use PEDs.
“I’m the only one to teach the Latinos about not to use,” he said.
MLB spokesman Rich Levin said, “We spend more time and effort educating our Latin players about PED use than we do our domestic players in the United States.”
