Manfred warns skippers about throwing at Astros
NORTH PORT, Fla. — With baseball ablaze over the Houston Astros’ cheating scandal, commissioner Rob Manfred met with nearly half of the major leagues’ managers Sunday and told them to knock off any notion of get-even beanballs.
“I hope that I made it extremely clear to them that retaliation in game by throwing at a batter intentionally will not be tolerated, whether it’s Houston or anybody else,” Manfred said. “It’s dangerous and it is not helpful to the current situation.”
Cody Bellinger, Kris Bryant, Trevor Bauer and Carlos Correa were among the AllStars recently trading threats, accusations and barbs as spring training opened. The revelation of Houston’s sign-stealing scam, the punishment imposed by Major League Baseball and poorly received apologies by the Astros further enhanced anger across the sport, with players, club management and fans all joining in.
“I think that the back and forth that’s gone on is not healthy,” Manfred said.
Manfred had previously planned to attend a news conference at the Atlanta Braves’ new camp, along with managers and representatives of teams training in Florida to talk about the upcoming season. Instead of an uplifting look at the upcoming season, as this annual press session typically is, there was no doubt what was the No. 1 topic.
Manfred said he would personally talk to the managers of the teams that train in Arizona on Tuesday.
In further fallout from the Astros’ scheme, Manfred said the investigation into the Boston Red Sox could be completed within two weeks. He also said he planned to meet the players’ union to discuss new rules limiting in-game video access.
“I do expect that we will for 2020 have really serious restrictions on player and playing personnel access to video in-game,” Manfred said. “I think it’s really important for us to send a message to our fans that not only did we investigate and punish, but we altered our policies in a way that will help make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Manfred said MLB officials discussed the possibility of vacating the Astros’ 2017 World Series championship.
“First of all, it had never happened in baseball,” Manfred said. “I am a precedent guy. The 2017 World Series will always be looked at as different, whether or not you put an asterisk or ask for the trophy back. Once you go down that road as for changing the result on the field, I just don’t know where you stop.”
Astros players were granted immunity for taking part in the investigation but Manfred said that “if I was in a world where I could have found the facts without granting immunity, I would have done that.”
“They had an obligation to play by the rules, and they didn’t,” Manfred said. ” I understand when say the players should have been punished.”
Jays great dies
TORONTO — Tony Fernández, a stylish shortstop who made five All-Star teams during his 17 seasons in the majors and helped the Toronto Blue Jays win the 1993 World Series, died Sunday after complications from a kidney disease. He was 57.
Fernández was taken off a life support system in the afternoon with his family present at a hospital in Weston, Florida, said Imrad Hallim, the director and co-founder of the Tony Fernández Foundation. Fernández had been in a medically induced coma and had waited years for a new kidney.
Fernández won four straight Gold Gloves with the Blue Jays in the 1980s and holds club records for career hits and games played.
“Not only was he a great ball player but a great human being as well. R.I.P. my brother. We will all miss you,” former Toronto teammate Joe Carter tweeted.
A clutch hitter in five trips to the postseason, Fernández had four separate stints with the Blue Jays and played for six other teams.
One of those was the New York Yankees, who replaced him at shortstop with 21-year-old Derek Jeter in 1996. Fernández was slated to slide over to second base and stick around as insurance, but he broke his right elbow (for the second time in his career) lunging for a ball late in spring training and missed the entire season.
Jeter, of course, went on to be voted the American League’s top rookie and win the first of his five World Series titles. Fernández, who had been set to help ease Jeter’s transition, was given a championship ring by the Yankees that season.
Fernández remains the last Yankee to hit for the cycle in a home game, accomplishing the feat in 1995.
Aced that test
TEMPE, Ariz. — Shohei Ohtani doesn’t just drive the ball anymore.
The Los Angeles Angels star notable for both his slugging and pitching said he got his California driver’s license in the offseason, putting the 25-yearold behind the wheel of a car for the first time.
“I’m enjoying it,” Ohtani said through his interpreter Saturday after rolling up to the team’s spring training complex in his Tesla. “I was able to pass it the first time, so not too much stress.”
Ohtani never got a license in his native Japan because the process is longer and more expensive, and he didn’t need to drive himself anywhere in Sapporo thanks to public transportation and his team. Since he joined the Angels in 2018 and moved to car-centric Southern California, he had been driven around by other people.
Ohtani said he thinks he’s a “pretty good” driver already, although he still hasn’t driven on the Los Angeles area’s famous freeways by himself.