Illegal Yankee dealings outlined by Fort Smith banker, attorney

Clay McKinney and Jason Browning have published a book about nefarious international acquisition of people. The book is not expected to be popular with the New York Yankees and Major League Baseball.

“Pinstripe Defection,” as the subtitle notes, is the story of a “Small Town Attorney’s Battle With The New York Yankees.” A Kindle (e-reader) edition of the book is already on Amazon.

The book is also available at a website created to promote the book.

McKinney, a banker with Simmons First in Fort Smith, and Browning, a partner with the Fort Smith law firm of Warner Smith Harris, have been friends for years, with Browning mentioning on occasion an ongoing legal battle with the Yankees and MLB. In May 2007, Browning mentioned as an aside to McKinney that the Yankees matter had been settled. McKinney then felt comfortable asking Browning to explain the issue.

“He laid out the story from beginning to end, and my eyes got bigger as the conversation went on. And at the end I said, ‘We’ve got to write about this.’ So that’s how this all got started,” McKinney explained.

Browning said he had not thought about the legal wrangling, which began in 2002, being worthy of a book.

“Never during the life of the proceeding did I think about this being book material. It was Clay that came up with the idea. It was Clay that thought this was a very interesting topic,” Browning said.

Browning handed McKinney a box of documents that included more than 20 tapes of video depositions and gave him one simple instruction.

“I told him he had to be creative, but to not be creative. He had to adhere to the facts,” Browning said, adding that the story simply “follows the life of the grievance.”

Keeping the story interesting while using “lawyerly-type writing,” was difficult, McKinney said. McKinney studied the materials for four months prior to writing.

THE STORY
The story is about a 29-year-old attorney and sports agent in Fort Smith finding himself representing Michel Hernandez in a case against the New York Yankees and Major League Baseball.

Hernandez, a catcher on the Havana Industrialists team, defected in 1996 while the team was playing a tournament inTabasco, Mexico. Working through agents and owners of the Yucatan Lion’s, the Yankees worked to get a contract with Hernandez.

“The Yankees decided to negotiate a deal for the player despite the fact they were violating rules governing Major League Baseball and likely the United States’ Cuban embargo. The contract was post-dated at the request of the Yankees to make events surrounding its signing even more difficult to prove,” noted an explainer from McKinney.

In September 2002, Hernandez reached the Yankees 40-man roster which prompted Gustavo Ricalde, Hernandez’ agent, to request payment. According to the book, the Yankees claimed they knew nothing of the contract and refused to pay.

It was about then that Ricalde was introduced to Browning.

“As the case unfolded, Browning discovered new information that implicated the Yankees in not only Ricalde’s case, but also other underhanded deals involving other Cuban defectors. A handwritten letter and one type written detailed bribery and other money under-the-table deals,” noted McKinney’s explainer.

The Yankees twice requested Allan H. “Bud” Selig, the commissioner of Major League Baseball, to dismiss the case but the requests were denied and Selig ordered arbitration hearings.

Yankee management delayed the case for four years, but in 2007 a settlement was brokered by Selig’s office — keeping the Yankees out of the potentially legal nastiness.

“Simply, Major League Baseball ultimately decided to protect their most profitable asset, the New York Yankees,” McKinney’s summary noted. (The City Wire has made a request for comment from Selig’s office.)

PUSHING THE BOOK
The first problem in getting the book written was to find a publisher. After more than two years of frustrations, McKinney and Browning decided to self publish and market their effort. Several publishing houses thought the story was good, but were not interested in offending the Yankees or MLB, McKinney and Browning said.

Now, about $7,500 later, the book is out and the pair are working with an Atlanta-based PR firm to help push the book to the media. They are also hopeful a connection with Michael Lewis — author of “The Big Short,” “Liar’s Poker,” and a contributing writer with Vanity Fair — will help promote the book. McKinney said Lewis is interested in the topic of how baseball teams operate. Lewis published in 2003 the book, “Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game,” about how the Oakland Athletics struggled to finance a competitive team.

It’s possible that the biggest promoter of the book will be the Yankees and Major League Baseball.

“We can guarantee you that when this comes out that the Yankees will not take this lightly. I can only imagine what kind of statements, if any, they will make to the press about this,” Browning said. “If George Steinbrenner, the father, were still alive, he’d come after me with guns a-blazing. The sons may be a little more tempered, but again, we’re dealing with the Yankees.”

Later in the interview, Browning noted with laughter: “I think we should have launched this thing in Boston.”

FAN REACTION
At least two fans of the book will be Hernandez, who has played with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays but is now looking for a team who will hire him, and Ricalde.

“They are absolutely onboard with this project. They cannot wait for this book to come out,” Browning said.

As to what baseball fans will think about the book, Browning is unsure. The average baseball fan who may already be cynical about the finances of the game, “they may view it as ‘Ho-hum, this is no surprise at all,” Browning said. But for the serious fans “who appreciate the transactional side of baseball, I think they will find it enlightening.”

McKinney said the initial attraction of a good baseball story was supplanted by the story of Cuban and other defectors who risk harm to themselves and family to attempt to play baseball in America.

“I really became interested in the plight of these kids, these baseball players, who really want a better life in America. They leave behind family members that could be harmed, or imprisoned (in Cuba). The way they (defectors) are treated by them (baseball teams and agents) is like a commodity. … They are almost like slaves,” McKinney

Browning believes the illegal dealing continues, but says MLB has been more proactive “in trying to clean up the international market.”

The price of the book is notable because it reflects Browning’s focus on detail in telling the story of a team he believes exemplifies what is wrong with the game.

The price? $19.73.

Why that price? It was the year George Steinbrenner bought the Yankees.