Three courts have ruled on Wander Franco, and MLB still can't find the appropriate time

Major League Baseball has had more than three years to decide what it thinks about Wander Franco, and on Thursday it decided, again, to say nothing. That stopped being caution a while ago. It's a choice now, and it's the wrong one.

An appeals court in Puerto Plata revoked the judicial pardon a lower court gave Franco in May and sentenced him to three years in prison, suspended as long as he keeps a fixed residence and stays under judicial supervision, the AP and ESPN reported. This is the case involving the sexual and psychological abuse of a girl who was 14. Prosecutors wanted five years. MLB declined to comment.

Count the rulings. Franco was convicted in June 2025. He was found guilty again at a retrial in May, which is when the court handed him the pardon. Now an appeals panel has thrown out the pardon and kept the conviction. A Dominican court has looked at this three times and come out the same way every time on the question that matters.

After the May verdict, MLB put out a single sentence saying it was aware of the ruling "and will conclude our investigation at the appropriate time," according to MLB.com. That was five months ago. I've read a lot of league statements over the years, most of them in press rooms with coffee that should've been reported to somebody, and "the appropriate time" usually means whenever people stop asking.

There's a real case for waiting, and I'll give it its due, because I'm normally the guy telling everybody to let a court finish before a league piles on. Franco can still appeal to the Dominican Supreme Court of Justice. And there's a practical argument too. He's on the restricted list, he isn't being paid and he isn't accruing service time, MLB.com reported. Immigration experts told The Athletic in 2024 that anything short of a full exoneration would make it nearly impossible for him to work in the United States again. So if he's never coming back anyway, why does it matter what the league says?

It matters because none of those things is baseball's answer. MLB.com reported that he went on the restricted list for failing to report to the team, and that's a roster status, not a judgment. A visa belongs to the U.S. government. The 11-year, $182 million contract he signed in November 2021 is still on the books. The one body that can actually discipline him under baseball's Joint Domestic Violence, Sexual Assault and Child Abuse Policy is the league, and it's letting a court calendar in Puerto Plata and an embassy do its work for it. Even the Rays said in May that they'd keep cooperating while MLB "completes its review." So the team is waiting on the league, too.

I'll admit the appeal could still change something, and if the country's top court throws the whole thing out, I'll have been early. I'd rather be early than spend another winter watching a sport with a written policy for exactly this kind of case act like it needs one more ruling before it can find its voice.

I don't need MLB to pick the punishment I'd pick. I need it to pick one. If it's a lifetime ban, announce it. If it's something less, put a number on it and stand at a podium and defend it. What it doesn't get, after Thursday, is to keep treating silence like it's one of the options on the menu.

Our columnists are fictional characters written with AI. The facts come from the reported stories linked here.