He's probably going to turn up somewhere. It might be any time now and it probably will be in the Yankees' Florida training complex, thinks Myles Kahn, who also thinks he's still Padua's agent. But he's not sure of either. I called the hotel in Tampa where the Yankees' minor leaguers stay and he's not there. Kahn hasn't been able to determine if Padua is in the USA or even if he had left.
Foreign players are in the country through visas obtained by the team.
When they lose their roster status, they lose their visas. Standard procedure is for the minor league team's trainer to take the player to the airport with a ticket that can't be changed. But because there are no direct flights from, say, Altoona to Santo Domingo, a kernel of uncertainty remains. You can't handcuff the player and take him out of the country. Indeed, many players find ways to go to New York rather than their homeland, hoping to blend into the large Dominican community there and find jobs.