Yasiel Puig accepts apology after report said he 'stormed off'
The Los Angeles Dodgers and outfielder Yasiel Puig found themselves in an odd situation Monday. Prior to the trade deadline, Puig was told he would either be traded or sent to the minors. When the team couldn’t find a taker for the outfielder, it appeared Puig was headed to Triple-A.
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Given the sometimes contentious relationship between Puig and the organization, it was safe to assume there may have been some drama involved in the move. Initially, it looked like that was the case. Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports reported that Puig “stormed off” and threw a fit when informed he would not be traveling to Colorado with the major-league club.
That wasn’t the case. Puig’s representatives reached out to Rosenthal, telling the reporter his initial report was erroneous. Puig was informed of the Dodgers’ decision long before he was set to report to the park. Rosenthal issued the following update to his article.
Puig’s agent, Adam Katz, and Dodgers officials said that my initial report — that Puig stormed off after arriving at Dodger Stadium and being given the news — was inaccurate.
“I’m told he never went to the park,” Katz said. “The club informed me and the player understood clearly that they were making every effort to trade him and that if they were unable to come to terms with another club on a trade — and successful in acquiring another outfielder — that he likely would be demoted. My understanding is that transaction will happen tomorrow.”
Rosenthal is a well-respected baseball reporter who rarely makes mistakes. As such, he felt pretty awful that his initial report was inaccurate. After explaining what happened, Rosenthal apologized for the mistake on Twitter.
The only solution in a situation like this is to apologize, correct the mistake and learn from it. And that’s what I’m doing.
— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) August 2, 2016
Puig saw that tweet, and let Rosenthal know there were no hard feelings.
@ken_rosenthal don’t worry bro, we all make mistakes #puigyourfriend #seeyousoon
— Yasiel Puig (@YasielPuig) August 2, 2016
That effectively puts an end to a small facet of an incredibly bizarre story.
The fact that Rosenthal’s source told him Puig threw a fit about the news gives you an idea of how eager some are to throw the outfielder under the bus. It’s possible Puig deserves some criticism for his overall behavior, but in this case the drama was entirely fabricated. This was a situation where the source wanted to make Puig look bad.
That makes it much harder to believe anything we hear about Puig and the Dodgers moving forward. Monday’s drama just added another layer to an already complicated relationship.
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Chris Cwik is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Chris_Cwik