This morning, Comcast reported that a Phillies employee may have witnessed Brett Myers hit his wife on a Boston street last Friday. If true, that would make the Phillies' handling of this situation even more reprehensible. You mean to tell me that if I go out with a friend from work and get charged with asssaulting someone else in front of that coworker, my boss isn't going to want to listen to my coworker's account. And if the coworker's account is as troubling as that of Courtney Knight, you think my boss would let come within 10 feet of the office.
Knight told The Boston Globe she witnessed the alleged attack. "It was disgusting," Knight said. "He was dragging her by the hair and slapping her across the face. She was yelling, 'I'm not going to let you do this to me anymore.' "
Knight said the 6-foot-4 ballplayer dwarfs his wife, who the police report said was 5 foot 4 and 120 pounds.
"She's a real small girl," Knight said. "It was awful."
The Phillies have to understand that their silence will not make this story go away, especially since they insist on trotting Myers out every five days.
What does it say about the Phillies when the Eagles suspended a superstar for an entire season and he wan't even arrested. I guess that's the cruel reality of pro sports. You can be charged with hitting your wife but you can't be a jerk.
I'll suggest it one more time Phillies: suspend Myers with pay and send him home, call a press conference to apologize for being so insensitive and let the case move through the courts.
Clearly the Phillies don't understand what they have done by turning their heads. It's time for fans to turn away from the Phillies.
1 comment:
There were rumors all weekend that a Phillies employee may have seen Myers' alleged attack, but even at this moment, I haven't gotten that confirmed. If it's true, a bad PR nightmare will get even worse for the Phils.
The problem will suspending Myers is this: he hasn't been convicted by the courts. The players' union, strong as it is, would have serious objection to the Phils suspending Myers, especially without pay. However, and this is where the Phillies erred, they could've sent him home to work out his problems, get counseling, etc.
As I wrote in a previous post, it's not like having Myers start Saturday was going to help the Phillies overtake the Mets for first place. They were still going to be 10 games out, even if he threw a no-hitter.
From a PR standpoint, it's hard to believe nobody in the front office suggested that they tell Myers to go away for a week or so.
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