WHAT A PHONEY!
Melky’s website cohort ran baseball calling-card scam, too
LONG BEFORE he came under scrutiny by baseball investigators for concocting a phony website scheme with Melky Cabrera last summer that backfired or allegedly visiting a now-shuttered Miami anti-aging clinic with steroid links, Juan Carlos Nunez held a seemingly innocuous post: MVP travel agent to Latin baseball stars.
Nunez worked out of Washington Heights in the mid-’90s, according to a baseball source, where “he befriended a lot of Latin players, people who would use him for travel needs.”
“He was known as a very good travel agent,” the source said.
Washington Heights is home to a large Dominican community and is where Manny Ramirez went to high school, starring at George Washington.
But while Nunez built a healthy client list and became well-known in baseball circles, including being introduced to powerful player agents Sam and Seth Levinson, there was at least one early warning sign that he was willing to push the envelope on some of his business practices and relationships. Nunez spearheaded a calling card scam in the early to mid-2000s, according to another source, and is believed to have roped in several players who ended up “getting used.”
“He did it without the Players Association’s permission,” said the second source, referring to the business venture. According to several sources, the scam involved selling consumers calling cards that featured baseball players’ likenesses, but the cards contained no minutes on them. Nunez was known as the “ringleader” of the scam, according to a baseball union source, but the scheme unraveled, although
not before several players were negatively affected. It is unclear if law enforcement looked into Nunez, or how vigorously the union may have sought to have Nunez banned from working with certified sports agents. He was not charged with a crime. But the union source said the Levinsons — who run the Brooklynbased ACES agency — “should have known about” Nunez before they hired him to work for them.
“(Nunez) was notorious throughout baseball,” said the union source. Nunez was introduced to the Levinsons by former major leag ue infielder Julio Lugo, who last played in 2011 for Atlanta, and who was a member of the 2007 World Series champion Red Sox. Lugo was a Levinsons client. The meeting with the Levinsons eventually led to the brothers hiring Nunez as a “paid consultant,” a term that Seth Levinson used when interviewed by t he Daily News last summer after the phony website Nunez created in an attempt to help explain Cabrera’s positive drug test.
It was a business deal the Levinsons probably wish they never had made. After Cabrera tested positive for elevated levels of synthetic testosterone — while the switch-hitter was putting up MVP-like numbers as the Giants’ starting left fielder — Nunez and Cabrera concocted the phony website. Nunez purchased an existing website for $10,000, and created a phony product purporting to contain unlabeled testosterone.
MLB investigators called the number on the website and arranged for a purchase of the product in an open air market in the Dominican Republic town of Haina. After purchasing the product, league officials sent it to a World Anti-Doping Agency-accredited lab, where it tested positive for steroids.
Nunez told The News la st August that he “was the only one who had dealings with the website” and that “neither Seth nor Sam had any dealings with the website, nor did anyone else in the (ACES) firm.”
After The News’ report on the Nunez/ Cabrera website scam, MLB banned Nunez from associating with any of the 30 MLB clubs, and from all team facilities. The Players Association censured the Levinsons for not adequately supervising Nunez, but the brothers escaped decertification. An MLB probe of the Levinsons is ongoing.
But the heat may be turned up on the Levinsons again after reports have said Nunez was a frequent visitor to Biogenesis, a Miami-area anti-aging clinic operated by Anthony Bosch that has since been closed. Bosch, as first reported by The News, is under investigation by MLB and federal authorities and has been linked to several star players, including Alex Rodriguez. A report in the Miami New Times weekly on Tuesday said A-Rod and others — including Cabrera — had procured performance-enhancing drugs from Bosch through Biogenesis. A Friday ESPN report said that Bosch had personally injected Rodriguez with PEDs and that Nunez was a frequent visitor to the clinic, perhaps to act as a gofer for other players. MLB will interview the players who have been named.
Rodriguez has denied getting PEDs from Bosch, as has Washington Nationals pitcher Gio Gonzalez, who was also named in the New Times report. Nunez could not be reached for comment by The News.
Before the Cabrera matter backfired, Nunez was a frequent visitor to Yankee Stadium, and would park his BMW outside Gate 2. He would wait for players after Yankee home games, and Nunez’s younger brother, Tirzon, was seen at the Stadium last year meeting with the Rangers’ Nelson Cruz, a Levinsons client and another player mentioned in the Miami New Times report as having obtained PEDs from Bosch. Tirzon Nunez played in the Expos’ minor league system in 2003 and played high school baseball at Brooklyn’s FDR High School.
Both Nunez brothers have frequented Citi Field in recent years, to help Latin players on the Mets and those on visiting teams. That is, until Juan Carlos Nunez was banned by MLB.