I find this guy to be pretty selfish. Not only does he disregard every other adult who’s a part of the organization by basically giving an ultimatum, he’s willing to throw the entire team under the bus to the media and cause this kind of drama a week before the season starts. Nobody fired him! He walked away on his own, unwilling to compromise! This is his doing, and nobody else’s. He could have dealt with the matter in a much more “adult†way. Perhaps, that is the root of the problem. He doesn’t know how to.
He’s apparently ingrained in his beliefs, and hey, that’s great. But don’t expect 24 other guys, and numerous other coaches and management, to just be “okay†with a kid being around ALL the time. As a 20 year old, as a 30 year old, sometimes you just want to be left alone with adults, to talk about, you know, adult stuff. I work with adults, and we talk about, well, adult stuff. And when there’s a kid close by you’re always going to be looking around your shoulder hoping the kids not around, wondering if what you say the kid might repeat, etc. Quite frankly, in an adult environment (such as a MLB field, dugout, clubhouse), it doesn’t allow you to be adults. And that can be very detrimental to an environment where at times there needs to be intense conversations, confrontations, words said to each other, that quite frankly, might be held back because there’s a kids sitting right there.
I think a couple unnamed players complained, a couple unnamed coaches complained, and someone had to bring it up to him, and now Kenny Williams is taking it up the wazoo. The players who were cool with it are defending this guy, and the media has taken the question mark and ran with it.
To be honest? I can’t imagine being a ballplayer in that kind of environment where I have to hold back or watch what I say EVERY DAY. It just doesn't seem productive or realistic. Especially when some of the best results come out of going at each other for a couple intense minutes to come to a realization that you all agree and you're just coming from different angles. Sometimes when you're encouraging you say vulgar stuff just to pump the guy up, and now you can't because kid.
If I played in the MLB, the second I saw this guys kid in the clubhouse I’d be like “What the hell is this twerp doing down here? Why is he on the field during warm ups? This is a professional organization. He's in my way. This kid doesn’t belong here.â€
Bye .207 Felicia!
Impossible for me to give a crying shoulder to millionaire crybaby ballplayers.