Let’s Talk About Junior Vizcaino
From international director to crosschecker: a career shaped by evaluation, patience, and the pursuit of talent.
This Thursday, May 21, Dominican prospect Esmerlyn Valdez was called up to MLB by the Pittsburgh Pirates. The 22-year-old player was signed in January 2021 by then-international director Junior Vizcaino and his group of scouts. Precisely him, a scout with more than 30 years in the baseball industry, came to my mind as soon as I posted the news on my X account.
Junior Vizcaino was fired on August 23, 2024, due to low production. Between August and September of 2024, a total of five International Scouting Directors lost their jobs across the industry, including Vizcaino. He now remains in the game as a scout for the Los Angeles Angels. However, the very thing for which Vizcaino was dismissed has now begun to produce results. The important part of his story is that when you build the right foundation, sooner or later, the results come. “Bottom line is we felt like to get better in this space and to produce more, it was time to make a change,” general manager Ben Cherington told reporters following that decision. In recent months, that same Cherington has called up four players scouted by Vizcaino.
Organizations such as the Mets, Marlins, Nationals, Pirates, and White Sox decided to rethink the direction of their international scouting departments, removing five international directors between August and September 2024. When the news became public, the reactions on social media toward Vizcaino were not fair.
Most fans in the Pittsburgh area attributed the limited impact of his signings to their lack of MLB contributions. In short, very few players reached the majors during the nearly seven-year period since he took over as International Director in 2017.
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However, baseball is always an unpredictable, ever-changing, and intangible game. By the middle of the 2026 season, while Vizcaino was working with the Angels, the accumulated results of years of work began to surface, with a wave of five players promoted to MLB within a span of a couple of months.
I spoke with Vizcaino recently over Zoom and wanted to hear his perspective on what happened and his current work. Regarding his dismissal from the Pirates, he told me:
“It was a big surprise because the work we were doing didn’t deserve what happened. According to the press release, they let me go due to low production, both me and Luis Silverio,” he said.
Silverio served as Senior Advisor of Latin American Operations. He has more than 40 years of experience in baseball, having worked in front offices, coaching staffs, and scouting departments. Luis was an MLB player with the Kansas City Royals in 1978.
By the time of his departure as Pirates international director, only infielder/outfielder Ji-Hwan Bae and right-handed pitcher Luis Ortiz had reached MLB. However, more than a dozen players signed during that period were either used as trade assets or selected in the Rule 5 Draft in December by other clubs.
Still, from late 2025 through May 2026, a total of five players scouted under Vizcaino’s leadership and his scouting staff have made their way to MLB contributions.
Players scouted by Junior Vizcaino and his staff promoted to MLB (2025–2026)
SS Tsung-Che Cheng (Taiwan) signed 2019–2020 period ($380,000)
RHP Wilber Dotel (Dominican Republic) signed 2019–2020 period ($65,000)
RHP Brandan Bidois (Australia) signed 2019–2020 period ($90,000)
RHP Domingo Gonzalez (Dominican Republic) signed 2017–2018 period ($10,000) *reached MLB with the Seattle Mariners
OF Esmerlyn Valdez (Dominican Republic) signed 2020–2021 ($130,000)
Vizcaino explains how he had to build the Pirates’ system from the ground up. Beyond addressing structural and operational challenges, he also focused on the intangible side: developing scouts with a clear philosophy for talent evaluation while also contributing across minor league systems and, ultimately, at the MLB level.
“I had a young scouting staff,” he said.
He and Luis Silverio spent significant time mentoring and training young scouts who joined the organization. One of the key differences he highlights is that organizations that dismissed international directors during that same August–September 2024 period also tended to part ways with their scouting staff. In Pittsburgh’s case, that did not happen, the only departures were Vizcaino and Silverio. According to him, that reflects positively on the work they did, since many of those evaluators, whether in the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, or elsewhere, were developed under their guidance.
“I used to watch talent videos and form my own opinion, but I wouldn’t impose it,” he added. “I let the scouts speak freely, and that helped build leadership so they could develop their own voices and improve.”
Whenever players were scouted, whether at showcases or tournaments, the group would meet afterward and spend hours discussing evaluations before reaching any decision.
“When we decided to sign a player, we didn’t take long,” he said.
That was the case with Esmerlyn Valdez, a power-hitting outfielder who, after being promoted, hit his first MLB home run this Sunday, May 24, in Toronto.
“I am very proud of the work and my scouting team did with Esmerlyn”, Vizcaino said when I asked him about the recently promoted talent.
With a smile on his face, Junior admits that he often reflects on the work he and his staff did with the players.
“When scouting Esmerlyn with had to project his ability and tools because the finished player you are seeing now is far from the young man we scouted”.
Vizcaino and his group first saw Valdez, now nicknamed “The Magician”, at a tournament in the United States. They then evaluated him a second time at the Pirates academy in the Dominican Republic.
“What impressed me most about him was that he hit in games, and that’s what I told Luis,” he said, referring to Luis Silverio, who at the time served as Senior Advisor of Latin American Operations. He was struck by how much better Valdez hit in games compared to batting practice. When asked why that often happens, Vizcaino explained:
“Pitch velocity varies a lot,” he said.
That observation led him to believe that Valdez’s ability to perform against live pitching was legitimate and that he had a real chance to progress through the system.
Junior Vizcaino, 61, currently works as a crosschecker for the Los Angeles Angels. He operates between the amateur and international scouting sectors, overseeing the high-level responsibility of evaluating players projected to be top selections in the MLB Draft.
His manner of speaking is calm and humble. He does not appear to hold much resentment about what happened in the past and remains focused on his current role with the Angels.
Vizcaino is a former minor league player drafted by the Pittsburgh Pirates in the 14th round of the 1987 Draft. He was a tall first baseman—6-foot-5—with power during the early years of his career between 1987 and 1988. However, after reaching Double-A around 1990, he exited the MLB system and began his scouting career with the Atlanta Braves in 1994, where he worked until 2000. He later moved to the Kansas City Royals and, in 2007, was promoted to National Scouting Supervisor. After a short yet successful stint as a Global Crosschecker with the Boston Red Sox, where he was instrumental in the signings of Ceddanne Rafaela and Brayan Bello, he returned to Pittsburgh, this time as International Director in December 2017.
Pirates general manager Ben Cherington later acknowledged Vizcaino’s work shortly after his dismissal:
“I think Junior is really a hard-working, loyal, proud scout who worked really hard for the Pirates,” Cherington said. “He did some things really well and came into a situation prior to me being here that needed attention and credibility, and he brought that attention and credibility.”
Life for the 61-year-old scout is now different. He is no longer a director nor responsible for overseeing hundreds of scouting operations. Instead, he travels across the country evaluating top talent for the 2026 MLB Draft. These days, more than ever, he is fully immersed in that role. He no longer seems concerned with the negative commentary that followed his tenure in Pittsburgh.
“People have to say something, because if they were telling the truth, I would still be there. We worked with integrity and never embarrassed the organization, we built a group that is still in place today.”
Many more prospects are still on the way, and talent evaluation remains as unpredictable as the players themselves. From Vizcaíno’s era, several prospects are currently ranked among the top 30 in the system, including Edward Florentino, Yordany De Los Santos, Tony Blanco Jr., and the flame-throwing Antwone Kelly, all of whom are progressing steadily toward the Major Leagues.
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