Every Philadelphia Phillies fan from this era, no matter how many games they've seen, knows the name Jose Alvarado. The 6-foot-2 southpaw made his Major League debut in 2017. After a trade that sent him to Philadelphia in 2020, Alvarado has been a consistently clutch mainstay in the back of the bullpen, and his dominance will continue for at least one more year before potentially facing free agency in 2027.
However, the 2025 season was one of the roughest the 30-year-old had seen in his career, but not due to his performance. On May 18, 2025, Alvarado was suspended for 80 games without pay after testing positive for exogenous testosterone, a chemical that stemmed from Alvarado's weight-loss supplements. The testosterone was a direct violation of the MLB's joint drug prevention and treatment program.
The Venezuelan reliever, who before his suspension had a 2.70 ERA, with 25 strikeouts (and four walks) in 20 innings, has always been one of the heartbeats of the Phillies clubhouse as well. From making friendship necklaces for the team during the 2023 regular season when he was put on the injured list with left elbow inflammation, to pitching through his son's leukemia diagnosis while struggling with his weight and mental health, Alvarado has been instrumental to this era of Phillies baseball.
So when it was announced earlier this year, about a week before the World Baseball Classic was set to begin, that Alvarado would no longer be pitching for the third consecutive WBC because he was denied insurance coverage, his team had to rise to the occasion. They managed to do so by defeating Team USA in the championship game after an epic run.
Jose Alvarado's absense casts a remorseful shadow over Team Venezuela's World Baseball Classic win
Much like how Team Venezuela's initial second baseman Jose Altuve was also denied, several international players faced this rejection due to risk assessments by underwriting at third-party insurers, such as the one that denied Alvarado; NFP, which assesses risks for MLB clubs, also denied Alvarado for being a "high-risk" player. Additionally, new rules added between the 2023 tournament and this one made it harder for players approaching 37 to obtain coverage, resulting in Altuve's absence.
Every player on a team's 40-man roster must be covered by an insurance provider agreed upon by the league and the MLB Players Association. They undergo physicals to determine new or preexisting injuries, and the insurance company then covers up to two years of player salary for position players, and four years for pitchers.
The most interesting part is that MLB teams could waive the insurance requirement and pay the player's salary, even if they get hurt during the tournament, as the Arizona Diamondbacks allowed first baseman Carlos Santana of Team Dominican Republic to play without insurance. If the Phillies wanted to, they could've helped Alvarado get to the tournament, but instead they kept him in Clearwater with the rest of the squad that did not get the invite.
Martin Perez and Carlos Narvaez were also denied insurance, resulting in their withdrawal from Team Venezuela's insurance list and preventing them from playing, but several of Pool D's biggest names were missing. Team Puerto Rico was the most affected, despite their hot start during pool play.
Both of Team Puerto Rico's shortstops, Francisco Lindor and Carlos Correa, were denied insurance, in addition to Victor Caratini, Jovani Moran, Emilio Pagan, and pitchers José BerrÃos and Alexis Diaz. Elly De La Cruz of Team Dominican Republic and Justin Lawrence from Team Panama were all denied. In the future, hopefully MLB can establish a centralized, league-funded insurance pool to handle the "high-risk" cases, allowing all the players lucky enough to be invited to play for their country, regardless of insurance hurdles.