Rimas Sports, the agency that represents Los Angeles Dodgers prospect Diego Cartaya, has fallen into trouble with the MLB Players Association after it was discovered they were violating agent regulations.
Rimas Sports was founded in April of 2023 by Puerto Rican artist Bad Bunny and his agent Noah Assad. The agency is based in Bad Bunny’s native Puerto Rico and its focus is on Latin American athletes.
Besides Cartaya, some of their clients include Francisco Alvarez and Ronny Mauricio of the New York Mets, Oswald Peraza of the New York Yankees, Ezequiel Tovar of the Colorado Rockies, and Eddie Rosario of the Washington Nationals.
Cartaya was among the first group of athletes signed by Rimas Sports and it was quite the coup for the agency as he was ranked No.13 overall in MLB Pipeline’s Top 100 Prospect Rankings in 2023 and was the second-highest ranked catcher on the list.
William Arroyo, the main MLB agent for Rimas Sports, is no longer a certified agent by the MLBPA after an investigation discovered he violated Section 5 of the MLBPA’s agent regulations, according to Alden Gonzalez, Jeff Passan, and Jorge Castillo of ESPN:
William Arroyo, the main baseball agent for the Bad Bunny-led agency Rimas Sports, had his Major League Baseball Players Association certification revoked after a union investigation into complaints from other agents about improper benefits provided to players, industry sources told ESPN.
The MLBPA received notice of the violations quickly, and it was discovered Rimas was offering extra incentives for players to switch agencies:
Within one week of Rimas’ official launch in mid-April 2023, the MLBPA received evidence the company had offered players cash and gifts to switch agencies, according to sources. Section 5 of the MLBPA’s agent regulations states that no agent “shall provide, cause to provide or promise to provide any money or any other thing of value to any player, or any person related to or associated with such player” for the purposes of persuading him to join or remain with an agency.
Agents who are not certified by the Players Association are not allowed to act on their behalf. It’s unclear at this time what it means for Cartaya and other players who were part of Rimas Sports.
Diego Cartaya’s path to the Dodgers murky
Cartaya seemed to be on the fast track to the Major League level not long ago, but injuries and struggles in Double-A Tulsa have since halted that talk for the time being. In 2023 with Tulsa, he had a .189 average, .657 on-base plus slugging percentage and a 33% strikeout rate.
He ended that season on the injured list and dealt with back issues that caused him to miss all of Spring Training this year.
He is active to start this season with Tulsa and has similar offensive numbers so far, but he has only played four games. On a positive note, he has almost as many walks as he does strikeouts in 14 at-bats.
With the recent long term extension of Will Smith and the rise of 2022 MLB Draft pick Dalton Rushing, Cartaya’s path to the Major League is unclear at this point.
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