Jeffress’s career in limbo after drunk driving arrest
Rangers reliever, booked into Texas jail Friday, on restricted list
ARLINGTON, Texas — Texas Rangers reliever Jeremy Jeffress remained away from the team Saturday while Major League Baseball looked into his arrest on a drunken driving charge.
Jeffress was put on MLB’s restricted list Friday, hours after he was booked into a Dallas County jail on a charge of driving while intoxicated.
Thad Levine, the team’s assistant general manager, said the players’ union was working closely with the commissioner’s office, along with Jeffress and his agent, to “determine a best course of action moving forward.” Levine said he didn’t know the time frame for a decision.
“We knew all along once you place a guy on the restricted list, it’s in Major League Baseball’s hands as to when he gets reinstated,” Levine said before Saturday night’s game against Cleveland. “This is a little bit of a unique case because I think the union’s working in concert with Major League Baseball on this, so they’re trying to come to the best resolution they can. Once he was placed on the restricted list, we yielded any real control. And quite frankly, I think we do not say or have jurisdiction over this matter.”
The 28-year-old Jeffress was put on MLB’s restricted list Friday and could possibly face a suspension.
Online records for the Dallas County jail show he was booked around 5:15 a.m. Friday, about three hours after he was pulled over by a Dallas police officer during a traffic stop. Jeffress is free on a $500 bond.
Jeffress was twice suspended while in the minor leagues for violating drug rules — for 50 games in 2007 and the last for 100 games in 2009. He came to Texas with catcher Jonathan Lucroy from the Milwaukee Brewers in a trade Aug. 1.
“I know he fights some stuff on the personal level,” Lucroy said Friday. “Whenever you’re dealing with stuff in your personal life like that, that becomes way more important than the game. And we have to help him get through whatever he’s trying to get through, to help him be OK in life.”
The hard-throwing right-hander became the closer this season for the Brewers, recording 27 of his 28 career saves before the trade. As one of the set-up men for AL West-leading Texas, Jeffress has no record and no saves with a 4.00 ERA in nine appearances.