CC: Typical of Tex to rip Cano for ban M
Brandon covers all bases
CC Sabathia appeared to take exception with former Yankee teammate Mark Teixeira saying he was “not surprised” that Robinson Cano received an 80-game drug ban.
“I don’t want to get into what Tex said, but I’ll put it like this: I’m not surprised he said that, coming from him,” Sabathia said Thursday on CBS Radio’s “Tiki and Tierney.”
When told about Sabathia’s comments during a segment on the Michael Kay Show, Teixeira chalked it up to always speaking his mind.
“That means that I’m very outspoken,” Teixeira said. “I’ve had plenty of run-ins with teammates or with media standing up for things that maybe I believe in. Sometimes I’m right, sometimes I’m wrong. And my guess is CC knows that about me. I’ve played with him for eight years. He knows that I’ll speak my mind. And whether you think I’m right or wrong, that’s your prerogative. But I am going to say what’s on my mind — especially working for ESPN, I have to. ESPN would fire me tomorrow if I just said no comment to every maybe tough question.”
Asked if he wasn’t liked in the clubhouse as a result of his stance, Teixeira responded: “I hope not. If you don’t like me because I stand up against steroids, then hey that’s your prerogative. But there are certain things that I can’t control. And, I always tried to play hard, I always tried to treat my teammates with respect.
Did I stand up against certain things that I didn’t like in the clubhouse? Absolutely. Will a lot of those things stay quiet? Yeah. But steroids is a public thing that many times I had to say what I believed and again I’m not going to apologize for that.”
Sabathia, who was close with Cano when they played together in New York, didn’t get into specifics about his former teammate, but referred more to the state of steroids in baseball today.
“That was a little disappointing and sad,” Sabathia said. “He’s one of my guys, but like I said when it initially happened I can’t put it past anybody anymore.” ILWAUKEE — Brandon Nimmo could not be stopped. The left fielder reached base a career-high five times Thursday night. He had a career-high four hits and a walk in the Mets’ 5-0 win over the Brewers at Miller Park.
Nimmo doubled twice, hit his fourth triple and beat out an infield single. It was exactly what Mickey Callaway needed to see from his lineup Thursday.
“I think that the extra-base hits are coming. The doubles tonight, the homers (the other night),” the Mets manager said of what has impressed him about the fill-in outfielder. “When you have a guy who can be as patient as he can be and walk and then also hit extra-base hits, turns into a really valuable player.”
Nimmo sparked a sluggish offense, which concerned Callaway enough to call a meeting of his coaches before the game. Heading into the series-opener, the Mets had scored the second fewest runs in the majors in the month of May.
“The coaches and I had a meeting about just that today again to try and figure out some ways, I think in the past here it’s kind of been wait around and the streaks will come,” the first-year manager said Thursday afternoon. “We talked about that being a challenge to everybody in the clubhouse. We have the hitters we have. Jay Bruce has a great track record of putting up numbers, but he can still improve.”
Bruce doubled in the ninth and Callaway said he saw improvement in his approach. The skipper thinks there was some evidence that his meeting produced results in the 13-hit performance.
“I think that guys stayed on the ball a little bit more and when you do that, good things happen,” Callaway said. “We had about four or five guys really take some good at-bats tonight. Even Jay Bruce, his last few at bats were really good.”
But a streaky hitter throughout his career — except last season — Bruce isn’t going to suddenly change his stripes. And a team constructed on streaky power hitters isn’t going to become a lineup that manufactures runs.
“We’ve talked about that stuff. So we’re going to be proactive in the way we take batting practice, the things we think about, give them something that they can think about as a group in their work,” Callaway said.