Social media posts advertising cockfighting tournaments in Puerto Rico appeared to link Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Edwin Díaz and two of the sport’s top jockeys to an activity banned under federal law on the island. The posts, highlighted in a report published Thursday, showed Díaz in his Dodgers uniform and advertised Jose Ortiz and Irad Ortiz as participants in a 2025 event.
Díaz, a three-time All-Star from Puerto Rico, was quoted in March in El Nuevo Día saying cockfighting had been a pastime he had followed since he was a child. He also said he was attending a tournament in which his family entered four roosters. In that interview, Díaz said, “It’s legal in Puerto Rico, thank God. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be here,” and added, “It’s something I’ve done since childhood, something my dad instilled in me.”
The timing gives the latest claims sharper weight. The Dodgers signed Díaz to a three-year, $69-million contract in December 2025 and announced last month that he was having surgery to remove loose bodies in his right elbow and would be out until the second half of the season. The Ortiz brothers, who like Díaz were born in Puerto Rico, are among the most recognized jockeys in horse racing and were listed in a Dec. 17, 2025, Facebook post by Club Gallistico de Puerto Rico as participants in a cockfighting event.
That post said Irad Ortiz and Jose Ortiz had accepted the challenge of taking part in the Caribbean Grand Champion tournament with a single goal of becoming undisputed champions. Kentucky Horse Racing and Gaming later opened an investigation after receiving reports that the brothers were participating in a cockfighting event, and stewards met with both men during the inquiry. Afterward, the agency elected not to take administrative action against either rider.
The dispute lands in a place where cockfighting remains deeply rooted and fiercely contested. Puerto Rico banned the practice under a federal law that took effect in 2019, but the island also passed a law saying it is legal to host cockfights as long as people do not export or import the animals or any goods or services related to cockfighting. The U.S. Supreme Court declined in 2021 to hear a challenge to the federal ban, leaving the conflict between local custom and federal law in place.
That gap is what keeps surfacing in cases like this. Cockfighting has long been described in Puerto Rico as a cultural tradition and a major industry, and many residents saw the 2019 federal ban as an attack on their culture. The latest posts do not settle whether anyone broke the law, but they do show how quickly a practice once treated as local custom can become a public controversy when named athletes are pulled into it.
For Díaz, the issue now sits well beyond the diamond. The pitcher is recovering from elbow surgery, but the attention around the posts is likely to follow him into the season’s second half, when the Dodgers expect him back and the questions around his off-field associations will not vanish with the first pitch.
