Twins manager Ron Gardenhire is mad as hell and he isn’t going to take it anymore!
No, I’m not referring to the Twins once again crapping the bed in New York against the Yankees last night, I’m addressing the fact that Gardy is likely dog-tired of his injured relief pitchers taking to highfalutin social media sites and complaining how they may have been misdiagnosed by the team’s medical staff.
Pat Neshek, the kooky-delivery sidearm setup man in the Twins bullpen who sat out the entire 2009 season due to Tommy John surgery, had been attempting to make a comeback this season when he suffered a finger injury about a month ago.
A disagreement between Neshek and the Twins organization on whether it made more sense for Neshek to rehab the injury in the minor leagues or go on the disabled list ensued. After hemming and hawing about how to best deal with the injury, Neshek ultimately felt he should go on the DL. The Twins were none to impressed by the timing of Neshek’s decision.
And that’s when the relief pitcher took to Facebook and Twiiter to vent his frustration on how he believed he had been misdiagnosed by Minnesota’s medical staff.
Given how teams try to be as secretive as they can about the extent of players’ injuries coupled with the propensity of athletes who now utilize sites like Facebook and Twitter, an ugly situation like this was sure to develop. And given that Neshek is one of the most prolific users of social media in Major League Baseball (he regularly updates his own website), it is not surprising he took to his favorite medium and wrote:
Via the Pioneer Press:
“I’m not happy with anything that has gone on especially when it could have been taken care (of) 3 weeks ago and was told the wrong info. For me I’m not going to risk tearing a finger, I want this to be healed ASAP and I want to pitch ASAP. You have to understand the press really doesn’t understand what is really going on other than what they read or what they hear and they need to have something to talk about.”
Yeesh. Probably not the best idea to hammer on the folks that sign your paychecks. Gardenhire, rightfully, was not happy about Neshek’s overactive updating. He had a little meeting with Neshek, which I assume involved a pretty volatile reaming. Gardenhire discussed it later:
“(I) was not very happy with him, and I talked to him. We got it all straightened out. He was just frustrated. We discussed the whole thing,” Gardenhire said. “Our doctors are here to help (players) and get you better, and they put in a lot of effort and time to do that. They don’t deserve to be thrown underneath any kind of bus. If you have something to say, you can say it, to me or to the doctors, not on (Twitter).
“We talked about it, and it’s done. It’s over. He understood. He was just frustrated at the time. He understood that it was not a good statement.”
Yeah, I can say with absolutely certainty this will not be the last time we see a situation like this develop.
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Twins’ Ron Gardenhire ‘not very happy’ Pat Neshek tweeted he’d been misdiagnosed [Pioneer Press]
