It’s probably never a good idea to anger a baseball slugger who goes by the nickname Joey Bats, as Colin Cowherd, the ESPN radio host, might have just learned.
On his show Thursday, Cowherd took a trip down tangent boulevard while talking about the Miami Marlins and ended up proclaiming that baseball can’t be “too complex” since it’s played by so many Dominicans. Oof.
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That didn’t please Toronto Blue Jays slugger Jose Bautista — or Mr. Bats, if you please — one of the many Dominican stars in MLB. He shot back:
Bautista has a right to be upset, since Cowherd was essentially insinuating that people from the Dominican Republic aren’t that bright in order to make the point that baseball isn’t complex in order to defend the Marlins hiring their general manager as their manager a few months ago. Why even bother talking about any of this?
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Andy Martino of the New York Daily News said other Dominican players in MLB were upset too. We don’t know who, specifically, but the list of MLB players from the Dominican is vast, with Albert Pujols, David Ortiz, Robinson Cano and Johnny Cueto among its biggest stars.
Hardball Talk has the rest of Cowherd’s statement, which as a whole is something of a head-scratcher, with one odd point stacked upon the next:
“It’s too complex? I’ve never bought into that ‘baseball is too complex.’ Really? A third of the sport is from the Dominican Republic. The Dominican Republic has not been known in my lifetime as having world class academic abilities. A lot of those kids come from rough backgrounds and have not had opportunities academically that other kids from other countries have. Baseball is like any sport. It’s mostly instincts. A sportswriter who covers baseball could go up to Tony La Russa and make an argument and Tony would listen and it would seem reasonable. There’s not a single NFL writer in the country who could diagram a play for Bill Belichick. You know, we get caught up in this whole ‘thinking-man’s game.’ Is it in the same family? Most people could do it. It’s not being a concert pianist. It’s in the same family.”
For his own sake, here’s hoping Cowherd can better explain himself to Bautista.
Worth noting here: Cowherd announced this week that he has plans to leave ESPN. He hasn’t formally named his next gig yet, but it’s been widely reported that Cowherd is joining Fox Sports. Fox, of course, is the biggest holder of MLB broadcast rights, so this oughta be fun.
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Mike Oz is the editor of Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at mikeozstew@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @MikeOz
- Colin Cowherd
- Jose Bautista
- ESPN
- MLB
- Dominican Republic
- Miami Marlins
