Here’s my take on players missing games for the birth of their children: if it’s early enough in the season where people are insisting there is no need to panic about the Red Sox 5-11 start, you’re excused. Apparently that is an opinion that Richie Whitt of the Dallas Observer and I differ greatly on.
Hardball Talk called our attention to a piece Whitt wrote on Monday in which he blasted Colby Lewis for missing his last start to be home with his wife, who was giving birth to their daughter. Here’s what he had to say about last year’s ALCS Game 6 hero.
Follow me this way to some confusion. Imagine if Jason Witten missed a game to attend the birth of a child. It’s just, I dunno, weird. Wrong even. Departures? Totally get it because at a funeral you’re saying goodbye to someone for the last time. But an arrival is merely saying hello to someone you’ll see the rest of your life … Baseball players are paid millions to play baseball. If that means “scheduling” births so they occur in the off-season, then so be it. Of the 365 days in a year, starting pitchers “work” maybe 40 of them, counting spring training and playoffs.
If it was a first child, maybe. But a second child causing a player to miss a game? Ludicrous.”
If Whitt’s goal was to make the entire universe think he’s a heartless d-bag, he couldn’t have come up with a better game plan. Lewis didn’t fake an injury or miss his start with a hangnail. How you could even call someone out about this less than 15 games into the season is beyond me. Yes, baseball players get a ton of money. That doesn’t mean they have to be emotionless robots.
