June 18, 2005

Playing Baseball: A Job Americans Won’t Do?
By Joe Guzzardi

When I sit down to write my weekly columns, one of the pitfalls that awaits me is sheer temptation.

I start research on one topic but then I soon find myself lured down an altogether different road.

What should take two hours turns into a six-hour stint as one Google search leads inevitably to another

Such are the fascinating interwoven complexities of the immigration issue.

Two weeks ago, for example, I wrote about the grousing of some Hispanic minor league baseball players about their chances of making the majors.

"We have to do it three times as well," said San Jose Giant Eliezer Alfonzo in reference to how he has to perform on the field vis-ÃÂ*-vis his American teammates in order to get a promotion.

That started me wondering: how do minor league players get to the United States? Do they to go home after their season ends and their visas expire? What happens to them if they stay?

The answer to my first question is easy. Unlike major league players who enter the U.S. on a P1 visa, minor leaguers depend on the all-purpose H-2B visa for "temporary" employees.

During pre-911 years, baseball was allotted 1,400 H-2B visasâ€â€