How Juan Carlos Oviedo became “Leo Nunez”

Old Gator brought my attention to a good story from yesterday’s Miami Herald, detailing how the pitcher we all know as Leo Nunez -- but who is in fact Juan Carlos Oviedo -- was able to pull the wool over everyone’s eyes for so long. Part of it is just the normal anonymity of a teenager:

One way Oviedo managed to keep his identity secret so long: Nobody in town ever knew his real name in the first place. The player’s nickname is “C.D.,” and most people here, even men who played ball with him, profess to never knowing his actual name. In fact, in this city of 125,000 people, the player the media refers to as “the pitcher formerly known as “Leo Núñez” is still known as Leo Núñez.

But the bigger part of it is how even the people who knew the truth didn’t feel at all compelled to let anyone know Oviedo’s real identity. About how baseball routinely takes advantage of teenagers with baseball promise in the Dominican Republic and how when, on occasion, the players themselves try to turn the tables, it’s not seen as fraud so much as it’s seen as someone fighting for any chance they can get in a system designed to chew up young ballplayers and spit them out.