2018 MLB GDT IT’S HEREEEEE

[deltarich87]

4 minutes ago, MightyMouse07 said:

This is something that is insanely common. There was a big push in the Bay to get people to stop saying "that's gay" when they mean that's stupid. They ran ads and all kinds of things. It's that kind of stuff and more exposure to people of different backgrounds that can prevent people from saying stupid things like this. 

Definitely. I saw those ads on tv back in the day too. Think one of them had Hilary Duff in it lol

I'm more relieved that that was the extent of the Trout tweets I found.

[DirtyDez]

18 minutes ago, redsoxsuck05 said:

If you are 18 years old and saying the N-word and "I hate gay people" on the internet, you are an idiot and deserve to be pilloried. It's bad enough for these things to be "on your mind" but you should have the maturity to keep these things to yourself at that age.

He should be criticized for his actions and will apologize etc.  His teammates will have his back and life will go on.  What exactly should happen to him?  You want him branded a racist/homophobe for the rest of his career over tweets from 2011?

[DirtyDez]

44 minutes ago, KhanYouDigIt said:

You act like he was 7 or 8 years old. 

I’m going to go ahead and say he’s a different person than he was in HS.

[Oregon Ducks]

Glad Segura took that ****** deep.

[ramssuperbowl99]

5 hours ago, titans0021 said:

What he tweeted was garbage and I'll have no sympathy for everything that comes down upon him for it, but let's not act like that was his full response.

There's more to it, but it's kind of tough to search for Josh Hader on twitter right now and get anything related to his post-game comments obviously.

 

With that said, I wish he had gone deeper into why the tweets were garbage. Rightfully, there wasn't really an apology or statement that he could've made that would have erased the damage the tweets will do. I'm not so far removed from 17 that I can't recognize that the old "I was a kid" defense is a cop out. Being dumb enough to not just have those thoughts, but to tweet them out, is pretty pitiful.

Yep, the "it doesn't reflect my beliefs now" defense...how do we know that? What have you done or said, and not when the spotlight is on, that suggests that's accurate? 

Those tweets are just indefensibly bad. And 17 is young, but it's not that young. There are 17 years olds who get quarter million dollar loans taken out with their brain and earning potential as the only collateral. There are 17 year olds who are preparing to get shipped out to the military, or are listening to debates because they are going to be voting in an upcoming election.

The mere fact that this story exists is a problem for baseball, and that reflects the damage that tweets like Hader's can do. There are no openly gay baseball players. The number of African-American baseball players is continuing to decline. The perception of baseball's culture is hyper-conservative, all the way down to "is it okay to celebrate when you do something good"? It's most famous politician is Curt Schilling. The best recent baseball TV show was Danny McBride doing a John Rocker impression. Baseball has a problem, and you can argue whether it's perception or not, but Josh Hader definitely didn't help. One apology isn't going to cut it.

[TENINCH]

Someday this country will go back to not being so offended over stupid things people say on social media.

Rappers say the N word in many songs. It's programmed into our vocabulary just from buying an album. If its ok for them it's ok for an 18 year old kid from BFE. He shouldn't have to pay for old mistakes.

[biggio7]

 I hate that word and hate when people use it. I hate when African Americans use that word cause they think it's cool. However, let's put a mic on the football field or basketball court to hear how often that word is uttered today by current players let alone when they were teenagers in an urban setting.

[Packerraymond]

1 hour ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

Yep, the "it doesn't reflect my beliefs now" defense...how do we know that? What have you done or said, and not when the spotlight is on, that suggests that's accurate? 

Those tweets are just indefensibly bad. And 17 is young, but it's not that young. There are 17 years olds who get quarter million dollar loans taken out with their brain and earning potential as the only collateral. There are 17 year olds who are preparing to get shipped out to the military, or are listening to debates because they are going to be voting in an upcoming election.

The mere fact that this story exists is a problem for baseball, and that reflects the damage that tweets like Hader's can do. There are no openly gay baseball players. The number of African-American baseball players is continuing to decline. The perception of baseball's culture is hyper-conservative, all the way down to "is it okay to celebrate when you do something good"? It's most famous politician is Curt Schilling. The best recent baseball TV show was Danny McBride doing a John Rocker impression. Baseball has a problem, and you can argue whether it's perception or not, but Josh Hader definitely didn't help. One apology isn't going to cut it.

How do we know? Because he's been surrounded by professional baseball athletes his entire career, which is a diverse group, and all we heard from teammates is what a great guy he is.

It's 2018, actions no longer mean more than words and spoken, thought out words are dead. All anyone cares about is the garbage that is social media. No one knows the guy and we're going to paint his entire character off of his Tweets as a 17 year old.

That's one of the dumbest times of your life. You say or do anything you think is funny with no filter to try and fit in and seem cool. I'll bet any money 95% of the people so upset about this would deem it totally unfair if a boss went back and found old social media posts or a photo of them doing an underage keg stand at a party and used it against them, yet when anyone famous has this happen to them they condemn them.

I'm calling this like it is, Hader was clearly an immature kid who said some really idiotic things. If he ever says them as an adult or acts out on them he deserves to be cut/suspended from his job. Unless that happens I'm not going to sit here and condemn him and let it offend me.

[Thelonebillsfan]

8 hours ago, redsoxsuck05 said:

Just a reminder that there are zero openly gay players in the game right now. Keep that in mind if there's any outrage from players or coaches over the homophobic tweets.

It's just sad that we're still not at a place as a culture in sports where gay players are STILL terrified, and sadly rightfully so of being blackballed and ostracized simply for being out.

We can all be better.

[Thelonebillsfan]

Don't use the n-word. Holy crap lol. Like come on I knew that when I was 8 years old a 17 year old DEFINITELY knows better. Just because he shouldn't be banned from all things forever and always doesn't mean we should excuse it. 

No, "rappers use it" isn't a defense, it's never been a defense.

[Thelonebillsfan]

Like, baseball is dying among the African American community, it's seen progressively more and more as the sport for the stodgy old white guy and stuff like this, certainly doesn't do anything but hurt the leagues image and if this coming to light even pushes one AA kid to play another sport or away from baseball than that's already damage done that could have been solved with a 17 year old kid literally stopping to think for 5 seconds "should I say this"?

Using the n-word and getting blowback from it is not "outrage culture" that's inane nonsense, we've accepted that as a cultural norm to polite society for decades. And I choose to hold a 17 year old to a higher standard than "kids say dumb ****". Social media being a megaphone to the world shouldn't make us less willing to challenge and deride these things.

What Josh Hader can do is take this and use it as a teaching moment for others, he can be a spokesman and use this newfound platform of infamy to stand up and tell people that this isn't okay. And yes, this is an action, this isn't just gossip at the water cooler like people think social media is, I've worked in tech for years now, the last several my wife has worked in cyber security and data collection, and nothing you say or surf on the internet is anonymous or forgotten, especially if you're on social media with an audience already. He took an action that broadcasted this to others in a public space, that's beyond being an idiot and saying "edgy" things with your friends while being a kid.

He needed and should have known better and he should use this to create a platform to help show and teach kids that they should know better, too.

[ramssuperbowl99]

53 minutes ago, Packerraymond said:

How do we know? Because he's been surrounded by professional baseball athletes his entire career, which is a diverse group, and all we heard from teammates is what a great guy he is.

It's 2018, actions no longer mean more than words and spoken, thought out words are dead. All anyone cares about is the garbage that is social media. No one knows the guy and we're going to paint his entire character off of his Tweets as a 17 year old.

I saw Lorenzo Cain say something, but didn't see anything else.

And yes, it's 2018, people talk with written word, and words matter. They've always mattered, we just have an impartial record of exactly what he said. And they've never mattered as much as actions, but they do matter. 

Athletes interact with people through social media, and keep their private lives private. And that's fine. But the side effect of that is that they'll be judged by the public on their social media.

53 minutes ago, Packerraymond said:

That's one of the dumbest times of your life. You say or do anything you think is funny with no filter to try and fit in and seem cool. I'll bet any money 95% of the people so upset about this would deem it totally unfair if a boss went back and found old social media posts or a photo of them doing an underage keg stand at a party and used it against them, yet when anyone famous has this happen to them they condemn them.

I'm calling this like it is, Hader was clearly an immature kid who said some really idiotic things. If he ever says them as an adult or acts out on them he deserves to be cut/suspended from his job. Unless that happens I'm not going to sit here and condemn him and let it offend me.

I never said or implied anything in my post that says this couldn't be why he said what he said. I never even speculated what Josh Hader really thinks about gay people or minorities. I did say that his apology and his explanation wasn't adequate, because it's not. Saying "I'm sorry, and that's not who I am now" is a great start to an apology, but shouldn't stand on it's own without at least some description of how you've changed.

And for the record, I'm not letting what he said personally offend me. There's a difference between being outraged and simply recognizing that what he's done isn't sufficient and noting that he's done damage to an already negatively perceived baseball culture.

[Packerraymond]

2 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

I saw Lorenzo Cain say something, but didn't see anything else.

And yes, it's 2018, people talk with written word, and words matter. They've always mattered, we just have an impartial record of exactly what he said. And they've never mattered as much as actions, but they do matter. 

Athletes interact with people through social media, and keep their private lives private. And that's fine. But the side effect of that is that they'll be judged by the public on their social media.

I never said or implied anything in my post that says this couldn't be why he said what he said. I never even speculated what Josh Hader really thinks about gay people or minorities. I did say that his apology and his explanation wasn't adequate, because it's not. Saying "I'm sorry, and that's not who I am now" is a great start to an apology, but shouldn't stand on it's own without at least some description of how you've changed.

And for the record, I'm not letting what he said personally offend me. There's a difference between being outraged and simply recognizing that what he's done isn't sufficient and noting that he's done damage to an already negatively perceived baseball culture.

My first paragraph was more directed at you and the others to what I've read on here and elsewhere, should've separated them better, haven't seen you say those things.

I honestly don't think him even bringing up true examples of how he's changed will do much. The crowd that truly gets offended by this stuff and is outraged will hold onto these words moreso than his actions and that was my point.

[ramssuperbowl99]

11 minutes ago, Packerraymond said:

My first paragraph was more directed at you and the others to what I've read on here and elsewhere, should've separated them better, haven't seen you say those things.

I honestly don't think him even bringing up true examples of how he's changed will do much. The crowd that truly gets offended by this stuff and is outraged will hold onto these words moreso than his actions and that was my point.

Ahh fair enough.

Yeah there are people who are going to use this as an opportunity to get mad to advance an agenda. There are also people who are going to be sincerely offended, and honestly I'm not going to blame someone who gets sincerely offended when they read some of the stuff he wrote. By any standard in our society, what he wrote was offensive.

And yes, there isn't any action he can take to un-ring that bell for everyone because anyone could think was he does positively, he's doing to save his own butt instead of our of a sincere desire to help others. I don't think the presence of cynical people should dissuade him from going above and beyond a standard "this isn't me anymore, I was an idiot and I'm deeply sorry" apology.

[Packerraymond]

7 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

Ahh fair enough.

Yeah there are people who are going to use this as an opportunity to get mad to advance an agenda. There are also people who are going to be sincerely offended, and honestly I'm not going to blame someone who gets sincerely offended when they read some of the stuff he wrote. By any standard in our society, what he wrote was offensive.

And yes, there isn't any action he can take to un-ring that bell for everyone because anyone could think was he does positively, he's doing to save his own butt instead of our of a sincere desire to help others. I don't think the presence of cynical people should dissuade him from going above and beyond a standard "this isn't me anymore, I was an idiot and I'm deeply sorry" apology.

Yeah it definitely wouldn't hurt his reputation to do that.

The fact that now we take a random occurrence of social media to use it to call someone a racist or all the other -ist or phobe words we have bugs me. Like if you go back to someone's youth and find this sort of stuff and there's no evidence verbally or action related of behavior since the guy probably isn't a racist.

Hell I'll admit it, I'm glad no one had a camera recording drunk 18 year old Packerraymond playing Cards Against Humanity with his college buddies or people would label me everything under the sun lol.