I would think comments like this won't fly in liberal Seattle...

[757690]

It's almost as shocking as when Captain Reynaud uncovered the illegal gambling occurring at Rick's Cafe.

A better analogy would be if Rick told everyone that gambling occurs at his cafe and that he knew about it the whole time, forcing Reynaud to do something about it.

[Joey Blotto]

The issue is that it's now out in the open, and there's nothing MLB can do about it. He handed a dagger to labor, and they'd be crazy not to use it to at least cut the cords restricting their movement. That statement almost assuredly cost ownership a year of player control and may cost them even more in damages.

It's a billion-dollar bonehead every elite AAA prospect can use to sue ownership for underhanded practices.

What exactly would the players base their lawsuit on? Is there a rule in the CBA that prohibits management from considering service-time implications when making roster moves?

[Bourgeois Zee]

What exactly would the players base their lawsuit on?

Procedural fairness and good faith would be my guess.

His comments show that ownership has acted in bad faith against player and sport welfare.

It's the smoking gun that Kris Bryant lacked.

[MoneyInTheBank]

1. He let the cat out of the bag about service time manipulation. I mean, I guess he did. Everyone knew it was going on. Change the rules if it's so bad, but it's not like he was lying.
2. So it's beyond the realm of possibility that Iawkuma was trying to hook a friend up with a job by pretending he needed a translator more than he actually did? So much so that to even suggest such a thing is racist? Really? This is the world we live in? Jeez...

Some of you need to re-read The Boy Who Cried Wolf.

And you know... If I had to guess, Mather probably is racist. I think the whole "his English isn't so good" jab at Rodriguez, in the context that it was in, shows more racist undertones than anything else I heard him say. And even that is more of a "roll your eyes at the old dude" moment than anything else.

Man, people are just waiting, HOPING... to pounce on anything. It's weird...

A couple things here:

- There is a giant chasm between doing the right thing and "not lying"

- For a guy who, in your own words, "probably is racist", why are we going out of our way to create and defend an entirely made up narrative that Iwakuma was hooking up a friend with a job? Is this not as alarmist as "crying wolf"?

- When 35-40% of your workforce is non-white, a team doesn't have to employ a President whose behavior is described as "roll your eyes at the old guy" because he says questionable things about non-white people

- The attempt to parcel out the interview and defend each piece as "not so bad" misses the forest for the trees. This interview, for me, was death by a thousand paper cuts. It wasn't one thing or two things that he said. The entire interview was a series of questionable judgements/statements that the Seattle Mariners do not have to tolerate

[757690]

What exactly would the players base their lawsuit on? Is there a rule in the CBA that prohibits management from considering service-time implications when making roster moves?

Teams are not allowed to keep players in the minors simply to delay their service time. I have no idea if this is a specific rule or if it falls under the “bad faith” rule, but this is what Kris Bryant filed a grivience with the Cubs over. He lost but only because he couldn’t prove that the Cubs kept him down in order to delay his service time, they argued they kept him down because he wasn’t ready for the majors yet.

This statement can now be used in numerous greviences and would likely lead to the players winning them.

[BCubb2003]

Teams are not allowed to keep players in the minors simply to delay their service time. I have no idea if this is a specific rule or if it falls under the “bad faith” rule, but this is what Kris Bryant filed a grivience with the Cubs over. He lost but only because he couldn’t prove that the Cubs kept him down in order to delay his service time, they argued they kept him down because he wasn’t ready for the majors yet.

This statement can now be used in numerous greviences and would likely lead to the players winning them.

Didn’t Senzel have this issue, too? Or was it rendered moot because of injuries?

[Bob Sheed]

- For a guy who, in your own words, "probably is racist", why are we going out of our way to create and defend an entirely made up narrative that Iwakuma was hooking up a friend with a job? Is this not as alarmist as "crying wolf"?

Is it a made-up narrative? Seems plausible to me. If I was in Iawkuma's shoes, I might do the same thing. Wouldn't be the first or last time a friend hooked up another friend with a nice paying phony-baloney job. Mather has probably done as much quite a few times. Still not seeing the racism there.

- When 35-40% of your workforce is non-white, a team doesn't have to employ a President whose behavior is described as "roll your eyes at the old guy" because he says questionable things about non-white people

This is a troubling double-standard. But interesting.

- The attempt to parcel out the interview and defend each piece as "not so bad" misses the forest for the trees. This interview, for me, was death by a thousand paper cuts. It wasn't one thing or two things that he said. The entire interview was a series of questionable judgements/statements that the Seattle Mariners do not have to tolerate

Agree here. I would have fired him too. But not for racism. I'm just not seeing that. Like you said though... when you paint the whole picture, dude was asking for it.

Didn’t Senzel have this issue, too? Or was it rendered moot because of injuries?

"It's a moo point. It's like a cow's opinion. It doesn't matter."

[Strikes Out Looking]

Didn’t Senzel have this issue, too? Or was it rendered moot because of injuries?

IIRC the Reds were trying to play the service time game with him, but his injury history has made it unlikely that he'll get too expensive in his first few years of arbitration. (Of course, too expensive with the Reds is not much more than the league minimum).

[MoneyInTheBank]

Is it a made-up narrative? Seems plausible to me. If I was in Iawkuma's shoes, I might do the same thing. Wouldn't be the first or last time a friend hooked up another friend with a nice paying phony-baloney job. Mather has probably done as much quite a few times. Still not seeing the racism there.

I have poured over the transcript a dozen times and I can't find any sign of him saying he was hooking up a friend or a buddy. Maybe the transcript isn't complete, so my apologies if that's the case. I keep saying it in this thread but maybe all caps and bold will help "I DON'T KNOW WHETHER THAT IS RACIST" but it was certainly gratuitous and embarrassing to his employer

This is a troubling double-standard. But interesting.

Agreed. Being able to say questionable things about other races because you're old is a troubling double standard

[Ron Madden]

Here's the link to the video of the Kevin Mathers speech


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=s85A0Q...ature=youtu.be

[Larry Schuler]

I have poured over the transcript a dozen times and I can't find any sign of him saying he was hooking up a friend or a buddy. Maybe the transcript isn't complete, so my apologies if that's the case. I keep saying it in this thread but maybe all caps and bold will help "I DON'T KNOW WHETHER THAT IS RACIST" but it was certainly gratuitous and embarrassing to his employer



Agreed. Being able to say questionable things about other races because you're old is a troubling double standard

It's OK to hold people accountable for saying racist things. We all get that part.

But to also make it illegal for us to let off steam by minimizing the racist statements and shoe-horning the scenario into a larger self-soothing point about society and cancel culture? Where does it end?

[757690]

Didn’t Senzel have this issue, too? Or was it rendered moot because of injuries?

The Reds absolutely held Senzel back for two weeks at the beginning of the 2019 season in order to delay his service time. His injuries had nothing to do with it, because he was on the MLB roster when he was inured, accruing service time while on the IL.

He would now have a case for a grevience if he chooses to file one.

[RedTeamGo!]

The Reds absolutely held Senzel back for two weeks at the beginning of the 2019 season in order to delay his service time. His injuries had nothing to do with it, because he was on the MLB roster when he was inured, accruing service time while on the IL.

He would now have a case for a grevience if he chooses to file one.

I don’t really understand how the disgraced former president of a different org saying something would give Senzel a case.

Also, if Senzel tried to file a grievance couldn’t MLB and the Reds just point to his MLB numbers and be like “see, he kinda sucks”?

Not exactly a Kris Bryant situation. I genuinely don’t think Senzel was ready.

[757690]

I don’t really understand how the disgraced former president of a different org saying something would give Senzel a case.

Also, if Senzel tried to file a grievance couldn’t MLB and the Reds just point to his MLB numbers and be like “see, he kinda sucks”?

Not exactly a Kris Bryant situation. I genuinely don’t think Senzel was ready.

All good points.

He’d have a case, as would nearly every player who was held back at the beginning of their career by around 2 weeks. Some cases would be stronger than others, most players would probably lose their case, but enough would win to make a major headache for MLB.

Senzel’s wouldn’t be one of the stronger cases, but not one of the weaker ones either, he seems to be right in the middle, since he was a top prospect who performed well enough in the minors to merit being in the bigs, .887 OPS in AAA the year before.

[texasdave]

All good points.

He’d have a case, as would nearly every player who was held back at the beginning of their career by around 2 weeks. Some cases would be stronger than others, most players would probably lose their case, but enough would win to make a major headache for MLB.

Senzel’s wouldn’t be one of the stronger cases, but not one of the weaker ones either, he seems to be right in the middle, since he was a top prospect who performed well enough in the minors to merit being in the bigs, .887 OPS in AAA the year before.

Senzel would not have had any case, since he was hurt at the end of Spring Training. Even if he would have been brought up to the bigs immediately, he would have already missed the first three weeks of the season.

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2019/...le-sprain.html

the injury will definitively keep (Senzel) in the minors long enough for the Reds to garner an additional year of club control