No, A’s coach Ryan Christenson was not doing Heil Hitler salute
Oakland A’s bench coach Ryan Christenson received some attention and questions for an inadvertent gesture he made after a 6-4 win over the Texas Rangers on Thursday.
Christenson had his arm extended waiting to do a karate chop to celebrate with his players after the victory, but his arm held out for a while, making it look like the “Heil Hitler” Nazi salute. His inadvertent move may have been pointed out to him by Liam Hendriks, leading Christenson to put his arm down.
Full video of @Athletics bench coach Ryan Christenson apparently giving two Nazi salutes #Athletics pic.twitter.com/xK8R4SWnHh
— @laaabaseball (@laaabaseball) August 7, 2020
Christenson says he received a call from Oakland’s general manager David Forst about the situation and knew exactly what the call would be about before he picked up. Christenson also said after the game that he didn’t realize the issue until Hendriks mentioned it, and that none of it was intentional.
Christenson said, “Obviously I wasn’t doing that intentionally. I just blacked out, my mind wasn’t there and I spaced out. I’m sure it looks terrible. I did it but it was not intentional. I don’t know what more to say.”
— Susan Slusser (@susanslusser) August 7, 2020
Most unbiased viewers will probably recognize Christenson didn’t realize how it looked until Hendriks pointed it out to him. But after some of the stuff that has gone on recently, people are on high alert for things like this.
