Balta1701

Most people demanding proof of abuse would probably be ok with “photos of the bruises”? “Ok you did that but why didn’t you pull out your phone as he was punching you” strikes me as a very odd reaction.

We call these SLAPP suits. They aren’t designed to actually win, they’re designed so that they make the people who are sued show up in the press, sometimes they have to pay their legal fees if they aren’t included in the costs of the dismissal which is common, but compared to the millions of dollars a Clevinger can afford for lawyers a battered former partner can’t afford anything like that even on a temporary basis so they’re likely to retract their statements even if they’re accurate just because of money. This type of lawsuit threat is a very standard thing for a guilty party who is trying to intimidate someone. https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/1019/slapp-suits Even the concept of this is why he should be on administrative leave. There is literally zero benefit and a ton of loss for MLB and for the White Sox In this playing out in public. This should be a private matter regardless of the outcome and no one comes out of this looking good. The end result of this is MLB having people associate them more with domestic assault and intimidation, regardless of what actually happened. This will cost millions long term at minimum For the White Sox and the MLB, but if Clevinger intimidates her into shutting up it’s worth millions to him. Just put him on leave and let me be bored with spring training fluff. A new manager handling this for weeks? Good luck.

Neither of those guys can play CF so one of the guys you mentioned or Hamilton still must make the roster.

Andrew Benintendi, one of the most bland and good but no where near exciting players in the big leagues, is a reason to be optimistic? Yup. Sounds like a summary to me.

What the Hell? Is this image super pixelated for anyone else? It works normally when I click on it but it's like a blown up thumbnail in this window?

Said yesterday? Nothing. Done previously? Refined his organizations background check and monitoring procedures following incidents like Vizquel and what they observed happening with Bauer. Not jumping to the front of the line signing this guy until appropriate personal checks were done. But that would have required effective leadership.

I read the Merkin version of this and it sounded so weird (ongoing treatments) that I thought that there was a typo and they were talking about Liam rather than Larissa.

Worth adding to that post. Not only did Hahn watch the Dodgers eat $30 million because of their weak background checks and fail to learn from it, this isn’t the first harassment issue in the recent White Sox organization under Hahn’s management. The White Sox endured a harassment case involving Vizquel and whatever else happened after that to get Wes Helms fired from managing their AAA roster last year after he was previously on Vizquels staff and was then promoted afterwards. With that recent history of failure to monitor and failure to conduct appropriate background checks, “oh now we know that we should have done this” is a completely unacceptable third strike.

According to Clevinger’s agent, he didn’t even know about the investigation until she shared her bruise photos. And even if his legal team was doing something, MLB should not have waited until February to be doing interviews with the victim. Clevinger doesn’t control her interview schedule. That should have been done months ago, all of them. People’s memories get worse over time, you don’t delay stuff like this unless you’re looking for reasons to cover it up.

Overall reactions to today: 1. There is absolutely an ongoing investigation. It is completely ludicrous that this isn’t completed yet. I’ve got no explanation for this other than Manfred was slow walking it and hoping it could be covered up. 2. Mike Clevinger should be on administrative leave today. There is absolutely an open investigation and a baseball team should not be hung with having to answer these questions or having his victim on the radio being interviewed. This isn’t just bad for the parties involved it’s horrible business for the whole league. How is “sports radio is interview a woman who shared photos of her bruises” anything you ever want your league dealing with??? Put him on leave and avoid this spectacle, you can count this as part of his suspension if and when it happens. 3. The White Sox didn’t do a bad job of answering questions today. If there’s an answer you hated, it’s a question that should never have had to be asked because of items 1, 2, and 4. In many cases there are no right answers. 4. Rick Hahn did an awful job of checking the background of a player with a checkered past. There is potentially a missed police record and likely a record of other s%*# that was missed. This would look bad on a GM having a great run, this is I think the 6th time this GM should have been fired. This isn’t excusable. 5. There is a very high chance that he will be suspended during the season. There is enough here that Manfred will say there’s a high chance something bad happened and he will hand down some discipline, the investigation will just determine how much. This will of course happen right after the White Sox have already lost a different pitcher to injury. Someone will say that no one could possibly have seen this coming.

This is bugging me also...I am half serious about thinking that Manfred gets these and if they're kept quiet he just delays and hopes they go away.

They would have had to have found out about the police report or something like that through an independent, outside of MLB investigation. In that case, they probably could have, but they'd have to have kept it confidential.

Did you see where I said "They won't give him enough time, they'll rush him back by May because they gotta help their dominant competitive roster, and they'll be lucky if things don't produce long term problems"?

There's also zero way for the White Sox to legitimately know "The Padres aren't interested".

Yeah, I get the disgust, but at the same time this is one case where Hahn's hands are tied by Manfred.

$11 a month for the app on its own.

Things I use audio for: -Listening to Sox games when I’m in the car, walking the dog at night, or an in the office late writing. things of zero use to me in those situations - Video content.

This is once that I wished you actually made a new thread rather than burying it. At least for the first month of the year that’s probably a skipped subscription for me. Will see how much I miss it.

While that’s true, what Clevinger is accused of seems at a much more severe level that anything in that list. Am I missing something? We can also discuss whether 30 years of time is enough to let things slide. Maybe some things the answer is no, maybe some times it depends on them doing their time or penance. Clevinger’s was last year and it doesn’t seem like he’s had any consequences. These don’t seem comparable to me unless there’s something not listed there. Daryl Boston would have been a better comparison, accused act was much more severe and totally unpunished.

It seems plausible that one reason why the victim would come forward with photos is that they felt they weren’t being heard by MLB. If we believe Clevinger’s agent, they didn’t know of this case at all until the article, meaning that Clevinger wasn’t interviewed about it over at least 4 months. Was Manfred trying to cover this up since there was no police report? Is that a normal policy of his MLB?

Does Bieniemy have a domestic abuse case coming anywhere near Clevingers on his history? It’s not on his Wikipedia page so I don’t know where to look for that.

Why does the new one look more worn out than the old one?

Based on the fact that the Padres knew about this, we can conclude that MLB knew about this at least in September of last year, possibly several months earlier than that. MLB needs to get off its lazy manfredian ass and do something. Either put him on leave and get a suspension done or if they have reason to support him they need to do so publicly. The domestic violence policy asks for this to be taken care of in a couple weeks, not a year. This isn’t fair to the victim, who seemingly had to share pictures of her bruises to make MLB get off their butts and listen to her. This isn’t fair to the White Sox players who have this guy around. This isn’t fair to the White Sox team who have a player whose status is unknown. This isn’t fair to white Sox fans who have to decide if they’re cheering their laundry or booing domestic abuse in Arizona. This isn’t even fair to Clevinger. Do your damn job Manfred. Either suspend him or say why you’re not, coward.

Trevor Bauer started 2022 on administrative leave and was not at Dodgers training camp. They did not decide his suspension until later.