Padres infielder banned for life by MLB for gambling on baseball

San Diego Padres infielder Tucupita Marcano received a lifetime ban from Major League Baseball on Tuesday for violating the league’s sports betting policy, MLB announced.

“The strict enforcement of Major League Baseball’s rules and policies governing gambling conduct is a critical component of upholding our most important priority: protecting the integrity of our games for the fans,” MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said in a statement. “The longstanding prohibition against betting on Major League Baseball games by those in the sport has been a bedrock principle for over a century. We have been clear that the privilege of playing in baseball comes with a responsibility to refrain from engaging in certain types of behavior that are legal for other people.”

Marcano, according to the league, placed 387 bets that totaled more than $150,000 in October 2022, as well as July 2023 through November.

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Marcano’s 387 baseball bets included international games and 231 MLB-related wagers for $87,319 between Oct. 16, 2022, and last Nov. 1. Twenty-five of those bets included wagers on Pirates games while he was on the team’s major league roster. Now 24, Marcano, has not played since tearing his right ACL last July 24 and was receiving medical treatment at PNC Park last year.

Marcano bet almost exclusively on the outcomes of games and lost all of his parlay bets involving the Pirates, winning just 4.3% of all of his MLB-related bets.

The Padres player wasn’t the only one to be punished by MLB on Tuesday, but he was the only one to receive the lifetime ban. Oakland Athletics pitcher Michael Kelly was suspended for one year, while minor leaguers including ex-Boston Red Sox prospect Jay Groome, Arizona Diamondbacks’ Andrew Saalfrank and Philadelpiha Phillies’ José Rodríguez also received a year suspension.

Marcano’s lifetime ban is the second given out to a North American athlete. Toronto Raptors forward Jontay Porter was banned permanently by the NBA in April for violating the league’s gambling policy after the NBA discovered he was “disclosing confidential information to sports bettors, limiting his own participation in one or more games for betting purposes, and betting on NBA games.”

The Associated Press contributed to this article