OH, COME ON MANN!
Machado says he’s not a ‘Johnny Hustle’ player
Just last week, Manny Machado graced the Daily News back page in a mockup Yankees uniform.
“Yanks must get Machado,” the caption read, just hours after news broke of Didi Gregorius needing Tommy John surgery.
But perhaps the Yanks should pump the brakes on all this Manny talk.
As if not hustling to first base on a routine grounder during Game 2 of the NLCS wasn’t bad enough, the star shortstop gave a bizarre response amid the backlash.
“Obviously I’m not going to change, I’m not the type of player who’s going to be ‘Johnny Hustle,’ and run down the line and slide to first base and … you know, whatever can happen,” Machado recently told The Athletic. “That’s just not my personality, that’s not my cup of tea, that’s not who I am.”
Imagine the boos pouring over from The Stadium if Machado strolled to first against the Red Sox, all after earning a $400 million paycheck from the Yankees during the winter.
This tabloid would have a field day.
“Should I have run on that pitch? Yeah … but I didn’t and I gotta pay the consequences for it. It does look bad. It looks terrible. I
look back at the video and I'm like, ‘Woah, what was I doing?' You know, just the emotions of the game … I'm the type of player that has stayed in the zone, I'm playing and I'm just in the zone.
“Should I have given it a little more effort? One hundred percent. (It's) my fault like always, I mean that's just my mentality when I'm in the game. (There are) things that you learn, things that you gotta change. I've tried changing it for eight years and I still can't figure it out but, one of these days I will.”
Even former Mets star Lenny Dykstra commented on what Machado had to say for himself.
“Duuuuuuuuuuuuude... #MannyMachado,” Dykstra, recently indicted for drug possession and terroristic threats stemming from a May Uber dispute, tweeted Tuesday in response to The Daily News story. “PS At the very least fake it to put on a show for the fans. AND WHAT PART OF "CONTRACT YEAR" DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND ?!?! I mean, the special vitamins I put into my body right before I was up for a new contract!”
By the way, vitamins likely equal steroids in this context, which Dykstra has in the past admitted to using during his career.
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts defended Machado on Monday. Roberts' team now trails the Brewers 2-1 in the NLCS.
“I know that he's doing a lot of things to help us win games,” Roberts told reporters. “I don't feel a need to have to address it. Some guys do that and take it, ‘I'm going to run so hard because I'm so mad.' He's guilty of going the other way. I don't think it's a disrespect to his teammates. There's no perfect player. A guy that posts every inning is hard to come by these days. For me, the net, it's not even close.”
This all of course came before Machado caused more of a stir in Game 3 with a couple questionable aggressive slides.