Thursday, June 7, 2007

Easy Target

Jason Giambi is an easy target.

He’s a trusting, decent, flawed person – which makes him just like the rest of us – who has no chance against a mean, vindictive mob led by Bud Selig.

Thankfully, teammates have his back.

“You’re getting punished for doing an interview and talking,” Mike Myers told the Daily News. “If this is the precedent that’s going to be set – that if you do an interview and speak out against Major League Baseball, we’re going to slap you on the wrists and say ‘Cooperate with (George) Mitchell and if we don’t like your answers, we’re going to punish you even worse’ – I think it’s a joke.”

Selig’s threat to suspend and/or fine Giambi for comments he made to a reporter if he doesn’t cooperate with Mitchell’s investigation sounds more like a back-alley shakedown.

“Bud thinks he can do whatever he wants,” said Mike Mussina.

The people with money and power always do.

It’s time for the Major League Baseball Players Association (MLBPA) to show Selig and Mitchell and the team owners that no one should be able to coerce testimony with threats.

Giambi may be an easy target, but the MLBPA and its membership are not. If Selig wanted to know how far he could push the players, I think he just found out.

Now he should prepare for the big push back.

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