NEW YORK — When the Yankees quietly parted ways with longtime international scouting director Donny Rowland in November 2025, Brian Cashman offered a simple explanation. He said Rowland’s contract had expired. The organization thanked him for his service and moved on.
The story never felt that clean. The aftermath was too chaotic. Pre-agreements with top international prospects dissolved one by one. The crown jewel of the 2026 signing class, Dominican shortstop Wandy Asigen, walked away and signed with the Mets for $3.8 million. The top hitter in the 2027 class, Mairon De La Rosa, bolted to the Mariners for the same amount. A 95-mph Venezuelan pitcher named Yeison Frontado backed out this week.
Now, a veteran MLB insider has put words to what many in the industry suspected all along. The Yankees did not simply let a contract expire. They fired Rowland. And the reason may go far deeper than just bad player evaluations.
The accusation that changes everything
New York sports columnist Bill Madden became the first major media voice to use the word “fired” when describing Rowland’s departure. On a recent broadcast, he went further than anyone else has been willing to go.
“Cashman said merely ‘his contract had expired’ but it was a lot more than that,” Madden said. “There have been reports of buscones at the Yankees’ Dominican Republic complex skimming millions of dollars of bonus money.”
Buscones are the unofficial player agents and handlers who operate throughout Latin America, particularly in the Dominican Republic. They serve as intermediaries between young prospects and MLB clubs, often taking a cut of signing bonuses in exchange for training, housing and access to scouts. The practice exists in a gray area of MLB rules. When it crosses certain lines, it becomes fraud.
Madden’s statement suggests that money the Yankees believed was going to prospects was instead being siphoned off by middlemen connected to the scouting operation at the team’s Dominican complex. If true, that would mean the Yankees were not just bad at evaluating talent. They were victims of a financial scheme that may have undermined their international program for years.
A decade of expensive misses built the case
Even before the allegations of skimming, the Yankees’ international track record under Rowland had come under heavy scrutiny. The Athletic’s Brendan Kuty reported that multiple sources within the organization cited a poor track record of turning big-money international signings into impact MLB players as a major factor in Rowland’s dismissal.
The numbers tell the story. From 2017 to 2023, the Yankees gave out eight international bonuses of at least $1 million. Of those eight players, only Jasson Dominguez and Kevin Alcantara have reached the big leagues. Alcantara was traded to the Cubs for Anthony Rizzo in 2021. Five of the remaining six had not advanced beyond Single-A as of the end of last season.
Dominguez himself has been a complicated return on a $5.1 million investment. Through 149 career MLB games, he has hit .248/.327/.397 with 16 home runs. He was one of the worst defensive outfielders in the American League in 2025. He is still just 22, but the franchise-altering ceiling that scouts once projected has not materialized.
Behind Dominguez came a wave of expensive prospects who stalled: Roderick Arias ($4 million in 2022), Brando Mayea ($4.35 million in 2023), Francisco Vilorio ($1.7 million in 2024) and Manny Cedeno ($2.5 million in 2025). Tens of millions of dollars spent. Almost no MLB production to show for it.
The fallout has been swift and damaging
Rowland’s departure in November triggered an immediate wave of defections. Asigen’s switch to the Mets in December was the most painful. He was the No. 2 ranked international prospect for the 2026 class according to MLB Pipeline, and the Yankees had committed the bulk of their $5.44 million bonus pool to sign him.
Then came De La Rosa, ranked as the top hitter in the 2027 class, who left for Seattle despite a reported $4.3 million pre-agreement with New York. Infielder Leonardo Feliz and his $1.3 million commitment disappeared. Venezuelan shortstop Josneybert Vera followed. This week, the 16-year-old Frontado, a right-handed pitcher already throwing 95 mph, backed out of his preliminary deal.
In total, the Yankees have lost more than a dozen international prospects since Rowland was removed. The organization now has most of its bonus pool unspent and is essentially starting from scratch in a market where the best young talent has already committed elsewhere.
A new direction under Mario Garza
On Jan. 27, the Yankees promoted Mario Garza, a longtime internal employee, to lead the international scouting department. Garza is widely respected within the organization and is believed to have been disconnected from whatever issues existed under the previous leadership.
But the appointment has not stopped the bleeding. Prospects have continued to leave even after Garza’s promotion. The problem is not just about the person in charge. It is about the relationships that were built over 15 years and the trust that was shattered when those relationships ended overnight.
FanGraphs noted that when the head of an international department is fired, it is common for commitments to change or collapse entirely. Teams typically do not want a fired executive’s evaluations to drive multi-million dollar decisions for years into the future. But the scale of the Yankees’ reset is unusual, even by those standards.
The Yankees have maintained a pre-agreement with what sources describe as an elite 13-year-old prospect in the 2030 class. Whether that holds remains to be seen. For now, the franchise that once treated the international market as its greatest competitive advantage finds itself watching from the sideline as rivals sign the players the Yankees were supposed to land.
Madden’s revelation about the alleged skimming adds a new and troubling dimension to the story. It suggests this was not just a scouting failure. It may have been something far worse. And the Yankees are still cleaning up the damage.
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