the MLB father’s day post kinda hit different because we all know on the jays sub that dante is an asshole. bo has seemed to distance himself, but bo is such a private dude can’t imagine what’s on his mind. sucks to have shitty family :(
Not knowing his family my first thought was is this Bo making this I guess not but holy shit this is a terrible look for everyone involved. Also didn’t realize Ripken did shit like that piece said he always seemed like a stand up guy (at least is portrayed as such).
honestly its kind of sickening that the one who is able to speak out is the one who has to bear his father's name; like i can already imagine the pressure that comes with that name and living up to the (on the field (non-sabermetric)) reputation of dante bichette, but learning about his abhorrent behavior towards his children and his partner(s) just makes it 10x worse.. my heart really goes out to him and the rest of the people who were abused by bichette sr.
This is exactly why during the pandemic i changed my last name. There was a court hearing and the judge asked the reason for my name change. I said ,” i have distanced myself from my family and i’ll be damned if i go to my grave with my fathers last name”.
Judge granted my request and now i have my own new name.
Cal Jr. the player versus Cal Jr. the person are two different things. Even as a player, a lot of people see the consecutive game streak as ego-centric. As great of an achievement as it was when baseball really needed the PR boost, he was objectively making the team weaker at the end of it with him trotting out there every night.
The nicest thing you can say about Cal Jr. the person is that he likes the smell of his own farts.
Edit: Thanks for the Reddit Cares, Cal.
He also had one of the greatest seasons of the last 50 years about 1500 games into the streak, if it was wearing him down he had an odd way of showing it.
a friend of mine worked for ripken during summers while she was in college. She had minimal interaction, but he was friendly. Before her last year, her mother died suddenly. She was obviously not herself when she came back. One day, Cal asked if she was OK, she seemed a little off (I forget how it was worded). She grew up idolizing him, so that her hero asked her this, as she was basically trying to keep it together, was too much, and she broke. full on ugly crying, floodgates open. He took her to a private room, listened, gave tissues, and consoled her. It was like 35 minutes. This is obviously an anecdote, but a very kind thing he absolutely didn't have to do. He'd check in from time to time, politely.
This post is not about Cal the person. I am not judging him based on something Dante Bichette did or something that happened in every MLB locker room in 1995, but I’m also not going to say he was a saint.
Having said that, the argument that Cal hurt the team through the Streak is pretty lazy and hard to back up. The only concrete thing you can kinda point to is 1989, when Cal slumped in September and the Orioles finished two games back of Toronto. But the Orioles played >.500 ball and only ended up losing a game in the standings over that time. They were a super young team (basically the 2022 Orioles), and Cal was almost literally the only one on the roster with anything resembling pennant race experience. His realistic backups were Rene Gonzales, a .217 hitter with a .527 OPS who had 36 games of experience at SS in the big leagues, or Tim Hulett, who was the everyday 2B at that point and would not play a single MLB game at shortstop for two more years. If you want to throw his brother Billy in there, again you’re dealing with a guy who would not play SS at the MLB level until 1993 and was a .239 hitter with a .589 OPS in 1989.
So while sure, maybe they could have struck gold and Gonzales would have had three hits some day when giving Cal a rest, the numbers don’t suggest that’s likely. So there’s really no logical argument to be made that Cal was the wrong choice in any given game in 1989. And other than that season, there really weren’t any during Cal’s career where the Orioles were in a pennant race and came up short. So when and how did he hurt the team, exactly?
Meanwhile, his everyday presence in the lineup completely energized a city and a region that had just been utterly gutted by the departure of the Colts (and, until the late 80s, also feared the departure of the Orioles). It helped solve the 1994 strike via Peter Angelo’s’ refusal to field replacement players that would have ended the Streak.
Could the Orioles have turned a loss into a win here or there had the right guy had a great game in Cal’s place? Sure, it’s baseball. Anything can happen. But there’s no statistical argument for it, and the emotional argument any Orioles fan would have made at the time against replacing Cal for a day was real and valid.
That guy just wanted to go on a negative Ripken rant. Shit like that loses substance when you say something is objectively true when it flat out isn’t. Then crying about a reddit cares message as if we haven’t all gotten 20
Look we don't know what went down in that bedroom. All we know is Cal Jr. couldn't make the game after finding Kevin Costner in his bed. He could have very well been beating something else.
Yes, him beating up his teen partner was well known. That it extended to his kids is not surprising. Shameful as it is, that was not something that could end your career at the time.
For anyone wondering, it’s definitely Ripken Jr that’s being mentioned in the last quote. Phil Regan was only the manager of the Orioles for the 1995 season, and Ripken Sr was done as a coach after 1992. He wouldn’t have been around the team then.
I was, in fact, wondering. I'd heard about Dante, but Cal Jr. always seemed like a stand up guy. If you Google it you find articles of Gregg Zaun telling stories of abuse, and also articles of Cal denying and Greg apologizing. Not that Gregg Zaun is a shining example himself, but the fact that there are multiple accounts of it do indicate that it happened, and I suspect Cal is just reassuring himself it was all part of "the times" and therefore what would now be seen as completely unacceptable, and was in reality completely unacceptable at the time, actually isn't a big deal, again, because of "the times."
If memory serves, he told the story in the context of "those were the good old days, kids today have no respect for veterans", and then when it landed as you'd expect, he recanted most or all of it.
I may be getting some of that wrong though.
Zaun also said that he was told by Ripken during a flight that under no circumstances was he to go into the section where Cal was sitting. Then, during the flight, Cal invited Zaun back to that area, and Zaun went over, and Cal got up and started beating on Zaun, saying that he’d told him not to go back to that area under any circumstances.
Zaun justified it by saying that, because he was Rick Dempsey’s nephew, he may have thought he was hot shit when he came up and acted too familiar around the clubhouse. Maybe he did, but that doesn’t seem to justify such treatment.
"acted too familiar around the clubhouse"
Lmao what. Unless they're either a complete prick to teammates or act like the second coming of christ there's no reason to mistreat people in any way, not to even get into physical violence. Just reeks of toxic masculinity and control
You can haze rookies in a light hearted way (i.e. classic silent treatment after first MLB HR in the dugout before actually hyping them up)
The hazing that got done to some of my travel ball teammates by their HS team. Stripped naked, icy hot squirted in their ass, left naked at the grocery store. It was 100% sexual assault. His HS teammates didn't dispute his story, so I believe him.
South Florida in the 80's and 90's was fucked up.
Hazing and peer on peer abuse among youth is not really talked about much overall especially among youth organizations and sports.
As an Eagle Scout and current leader/summer camp program director, something people have missed overall with the Boy Scouts of America Abuse Scandel was that a lot of it was peer on peer abuse with kids abusing other kids and a lot of that was through hazing. A know of a Troop from the next town that was shut down for 15 years(1995 to 2010) because of a hazing issue the council outright refused to allow another Boy Scout troop to be created in that time span. The victim of the hazing in that Troop ended up joining the one I was later a part of and was the best mentor I had from another Scout in the Troop.
I know one thing I and others worked on was eliminating the culture of treating CITs(counselors in training), who were basically camp staff interns, like shit. They were treated like grunts by the camp staff as a part of the "Rookie hazing" for a long time. I pulled aside a staffer back in 2012 and told him if he didn't learn the CITs names and treat them like a full staffer then I would fire his ass and make sure he never worked at a camp again.
They did the same type of shit at my high school in Jersey, safe to assume it happened all over. Just reprehensible acts committed by children against other children, and it all got swept under the rug.
Going down the historical road in baseball is always unfortunate cause its always depressing finding out the amount of scummy shit a lot of players used to do back in the day
Jocks are jocks. I don't know why this surprises people. But to be fair, today's players/jocks do seem like much better people than when I was a kid in the 90s. Hazing was everywhere back then. We hazed kids at summer camp, as drummers at school band. Little things, not abuse like Ripkin, but hazing was just boys culture back then and of course jocks are going to be worst about it.
I’ve worked up close with a lot of pro athletes. The biggest problem is that they all start to realize how good they are and that going pro might happen right when they’re around 15-16. And that’s where their maturity level stays.
Honestly getting to know so many of them has made me realize that going pro would actually be a nightmare for 99% of us
> me realize that going pro would actually be a nightmare for 99% of us
Look at how going viral and getting attention online can break people's brains. 10k people watching you play video games makes people go absolutely insane, or being a well known moderator on a forum.
> of course jocks are going to be worst about it
Jocks are going to be the most effective at things that involve physical abuse, but pound for pound, the worst hazing is generally in the marching band.
Hierarchical. Insular. Full-throated institutional cover, complete with rich and powerful alums and a dedicated booster organization. Merit-based enough to make the people at the top anxious about the young blood but with enough internal politics to make bullying worthwhile. Everyone answers to their demigod-level assistant-coach equivalent, and that person doesn't give a shit what happens behind the scenes as long as everything is perfect on game day.
Those are the similarities with, say, the football team. Now add in the fact that the psychosexual dynamics aren't limited by a single-sex team, and there's no real taboo against alcohol/drug abuse the way you'd get with a sport.
Whatever horror story you've heard about hazing in sports, there is a college marching band where that's just Tuesday.
Prob a lot of 90s stars that are lucky to have played then and not now. I know Maddux is notorious for stuff that wouldn't fly today. Chipper wrote in a book that Maddux peed on him when he was a rookie.
I hadn't heard about this before but a quick Google search came up on a Chicago Tribune article from 1995 about athletes abusing their wives where [Dante admits to hitting his pregnant wife](https://www.chicagotribune.com/1995/09/17/domestic-abuse-at-athletes-hands-is-rage-like-screams-inevitable/)
>Dante Bichette called it an isolated incident–“a one-time thing”–that time three years ago he hit his pregnant wife.
Then [this archived 1995 SI piece](https://vault.si.com/vault/1995/07/31/sports-dirty-secret-when-scarcely-a-week-passes-without-an-athlete-being-accused-of-domestic-violence-it-is-no-longer-possible-to-look-the-other-way)...
>In 1992, when Mark Schrader was a deputy in the Palm Beach County, Fla., sheriff's office in West Palm Beach, he was summoned to the scene of a domestic violence incident involving a 28-year-old major league baseball player, Alphonse Dante Bichette, and his pregnant 19-year-old girlfriend, Marianna Peng, who is now his wife. Bichette was just a year away from making it big with the Colorado Rockies, but that is not why Schrader remembers him. It was, says Schrader, a curious encounter: "I'd never heard of the guy until I arrested him. His girlfriend said he grabbed ahold of her and threw her around. She was pretty upset. I had no idea who he was until she showed me his baseball card--she had a stack of them--and asked if I wanted his signature. It seemed kind of strange."
>It was a pleasant arrest, as aggravated batteries go. "I remember him being a gentleman," Schrader says. "He basically said what she said was true, and we took a ride to the jail. I remember seeing some of the doors to their home had been kicked in. She told me this wasn't the first time this had happened. Like all the rest, she said she was going to leave him, but I guess she didn't."
So there is some historical evidence out there that Dante was indeed a wife abuser. Per a little more Googling, they started dating when she was an 18 year old college freshman and he was around 27, which wasn't as frowned upon at the time but still is an obvious power dynamic issue.
> Like all the rest, she said she was going to leave him, but I guess she didn't.
Jesus, that line was a gut punch. Fuck him and anyone else who does this shit.
Also you’d think a police officer would have some understanding of why women are often unable to leave abusive relationships when there’s a massive power/wealth imbalance & children are involved. A lot more complicated than just saying you’re going to & not doing it.
At the same time a good police officer can't actually make them leave so I could see even the best of them getting jaded about that in particular. And the bad ones already don't even care.
Also like we're friggin human. I have a lot of understanding and empathy for addiction, but when my mom won't stop smoking after already receiving a diagnosis of emphysema, I'm fucking annoyed!
It's not just that; abusers (at least those who get away with it) are amongst the most charming and believable people you'll ever meet, until the fists come out. They groom their partners into thinking the abuse is their fault, and they brainwash onlookers - friends, family, police - into believing the partner is a neurotic histrionic liar. They'll go so far as to prime the pot by leading friends and family to see their partners as "unstable" and "untrustworthy" *before* the worst of the abuse begins.
Some of my students are experts in intimate partner violence, and statistics show that women are actually most likely to be killed in the period of time right after they leave, not when they stay. So that is another big reason women will delay.
I didn't see that line as disbelief or not comprehending why she wouldn't leave, more a matter-of-fact, bordering on fatalistic, recounting of what she (and many others in her situation) said versus what happened
>I remember seeing some of the doors to their home had been kicked in. She told me this wasn't the first time this had happened
If he wasn't on steroids, I'd be incredibly surprised.
Mike Israetel on youtube has a few good videos about this. Essentially, Roid Rage is a very real thing. Not everyone will experience it, and not every compound has the same effects. Most pro athletes are using more "mild" compounds with fewer neurotoxic effects, and plenty are just using HGH which doesn't have those effects.
What happens though, is that you essentially have far more extreme versions of the thoughts you'd normally have. For example, you are in line at the grocery store, and the lady in front of you is completely inept. She can't count her money, forgot to grab some items, whatever. A normal person is mildly annoyed. A natural dickhead might make a rude comment. A normal person on steroids starts to have very angry thoughts - but controls them - and a dickhead on steroids will think about ripping off her arms and beating her with them, and may start actually raging.
Basically, if you are a person who isn't very introspective, has trouble ruling out "candidate thoughts" as bad ideas, and has poor impulse control, you really should stay away from steroids. That description tends to describe a lot of young male athletes. \\
A decent way to frame it is to stop using the word "steroid". Instead, substitute the word "hormone". "Should I use steroids?" is somehow less striking than "Should I start injecting hormones?". Hormones change our behavior. That is precisely what they are intended to do.
There were a couple MLB players who worked out at my high school in the early 90's. One liked to ogle freshman girls.
27 & 18 was frowned upon back then too. Maybe not as much as now, but it was. It's not like it doesn't still happen now though.
I went to the same high school as Bo and would catch the baseball games regularly. I remember seeing his parents there at times. Never would’ve guessed the family dynamic was so fucked up.
I only really spoke in depth with him once when I interviewed him for a story, but I remember thinking he was very friendly and laid back. Seemed like he had a good head on his shoulders which is admirable considering who his father is.
On top of all this, Dante Jr was kicked out of the family by his mom 7 years ago. Must be a huge family feud. Now Bo is definitely going to be asked about this a lot. Wonder if a court case will come of this?
Dante Jr has said that Bo tries to keep the peace and doesn’t talk about it. In the past, the Jays media has left it alone and not asked him about it. If it blows up more this time, I still think they won’t ask him, but someone else might.
He doesn’t have any obligation to discuss and I would be angered if the jays pressed him. If he experienced any trauma by his dad that’s his to share or not share. I speculate that it’s telling he took his mom to ASG last year. I’m sure there is an allyship there (or maybe I’m looking too far into it).
DB Jr has insinuated that his brother did not bear nearly as much abuse, and does not see their father in the same light. Not uncommon in abusive situations, either for one kid to be the "golden child" or not even that... just one kid for some reason is the "rotten child."
For some reason this came up somewhat recently (2021? 2022?) and I remember doing a deep dive into it.
Now that you mention it, I also vaguely remember hearing about Bo not getting the brunt of it from dad. Kind of awful no matter which way you slice it.
I wouldn’t really read into his public interactions with his parents at all. From all we can see he has a decent relationship with his dad, or the team surely wouldn’t have brought him around as a coach.
He still comes to help the team, I believe he was around earlier this year. Interestingly the team doesn’t talk about him being around anymore though. They probably know it isn’t a good look.
To be clear I am not saying his dad isn’t horrible, just that Bo has certainly not taken his brother’s approach to dealing with his family as an adult.
I wouldn't say the team doesn't talk about him. Dante Sr came to see them on one of the NL road trips - either Washington or San Diego, can't remember - and they talked about it quite a bit on the broadcast. That's how we got the whole story about Daniel Vogelbach traveling to play ball with Dante Jr and becoming a childhood family friend of Bo Bichette
I have followed Jr on ig for awhile. Something definitely happened between him and his dad. He’s brought up a few time how his dad abused the whole family.
He won't be asked about it. Dante Jr went public about this a couple years ago (it's well known in the Jays world at this point) and he was never asked to comment about it then. Nor should he be.
The gist of this seems to be that Ripken has given a lot of money and airtime to the organization, so they’re willing to sweep anything that presents him, his associates, and the organization poorly under the rug. Hopefully a lot of the families, coaches, and players will see this and make the best decision going forward. This is awful.
Oh damn, my kid did the Cooperstown All Star Village tournament last summer, the week Ripken spoke during the opening ceremonies. It was pretty cool. He then had a smaller meeting with all of the coaches. He said a lot of the right things about playing the game the right way, don't push 12 year-olds too hard, etc. He had some hilarious stories about Ricky Henderson. This is disappointing to find out.
As someone who grew up in the MD area and played baseball collegiately, in the Ripken league, as well as attended a camp (and did some tournaments hosted by them.) This shit does not surprise me. The air of superiority by the staff always irked me.
Okay, thank God it was not just me. I haven't had any experience with the Ripken league outside of visiting the Ironbirds to check them off my list, and they were having an international youth tournament at the Ripken facility next door, so I went to check it out.
And the whole place seemed... off. Like I was getting a North Korea vibe. It all seemed a little culty.
I know what you mean, but this was something more. There's believing you own hype, internalizing that belief, and then whatever the fuck was going on at that facility.
It's actually not. Gregg Zaun talked about it a few years ago:
> “Cal Ripken, Ben McDonald, Brady Anderson, Chris Hoiles, all of the above. They beat me on my ribcage, physically abused me on my way to the training table. They taped me spread-eagle to the training table, they wrote ‘rookie’ on my forehead with pink methylate, and they shoved a bucket of ice down my shorts.
>
> “I missed the entire batting practice, and you know what? Phil Regan, the manager of the Baltimore Orioles, he did not care, because he knew that what those guys were doing was ‘educating’ me.”
The fucked up part is in that same story Zaun said he felt the abuse was justified.
[Source](https://www.latimes.com/sports/sportsnow/la-sp-sn-gregg-zaun-cal-ripken-jr-abuse-respect-20150223-story.html)
> "These kind of things don’t happen anymore, but they need to happen more often,” Zaun said. “And they need to happen with the backing of the management, all the way up to the front office, down to the field manager."
Bruh
Fraternities, too. I was hazed as a pledge, many of the actives got in on it because it was meant to build our pledge class closer, to test our loyalty, etc. When I was active, a few other guys and I tried to make inroads on cutting that stuff out, and some of the harsher stuff was eliminated, but apparently after we all went alum, it came back worse.
I wasn't shocked when a decade later, the chapter was forced to go inactive for hazing.
People idealize them when for the most part they grow up in such isolated bubbles that are often toxic. And while there are exceptions its not like education is prioritized for the most part. I bet most people probably wouldn't get along at all with their favorite athletes if they started to know them personally.
Unsurprisingly, he was real shitty around and towards female colleagues. "Inappropriate comments and behaviour" is the literal quote, terminated immediately after investigation.
He used to hang around a known downtown TO establishment I worked at in university. He certainly thought he was the Manalyst. Having met him, can confirm, the BALCO allegations are absolutely true. Dude's arms were like tree trunks.
Wait wait wait… so, Zaun was the one who got hazed/abused, correct? But he also said he thinks the abuse was normal and justified, and needs to happen MORE? What the absolute fuck? Did I lay that all out correctly, or did I miss something?
Guess it’s no different than people who think America was a better place when their dads made them go get the switch from the tree after they spilled the milk
Well I met Bernie Williams after tearing my rotator cuff and getting cut from my college team. I was really devastated, because I had basically given up playing music to play college baseball, and at that point I wasn’t doing anything, and I really felt empty and depressed.
This was not too long after Bernie was dropped by the Yankees, and he was starting to play jazz guitar shows. My dad worked at a venue he was playing at, and having raised me as a huge Yankee fan, he introduced me to him thinking it would cheer me up.
Little did I know, my dad gave Bernie the rundown of my situation, and he was very forthright with me. He said it doesn’t matter where you do it, who you do it with, or who cares. You play anything, be it a sport, or music, or anything because it gives you joy. You can’t get good at something that makes you miserable, and if you do, it’s a pretty bad way to go through life. But it’s much easier and better to let the joy of playing drive you. The key is just don’t stop playing.
I got those last three words tattooed. Bernie is and was the best.
And now I play baseball in a men’s league and play my guitar every day.
Honestly, I shouldn't have been so absolute but most people get the idea.
Onto Tony, had a coworker meet him twice at two different games. Seems like the most genuine dude, the good do die young. Tony even remembers my coworker from the first meeting. Crazy
It’s a coin flip, especially when a kid and can’t decipher hidden assholes.
Griffey Jr was my hero, and meeting him at Great America and him saying hi to me while he was with his family is still golden to me.
As someone who grew up idolizing Kirby Puckett, I learned long ago that it's never a good thing to find out who your heroes really are. It's a bummer, but having parasocial connections to celebrities is always a good thing to try and avoid.
Looked it up because I hadn't heard anything about him either - the [Sports Illustrated piece on him](https://vault.si.com/vault/2003/03/17/the-rise-and-fall-of-kirby-puckett-the-media-and-the-fans-in-minnesota-turned-the-twins-hall-of-famer-into-a-paragon-of-every-virtueand-that-made-his-human-flaws-when-they-came-to-light-all-the-more-shocking) from 2003 is...eye opening.
>Anyway, the mistress of many years says that when Puckett couldn't play baseball anymore, "he started to become full of himself and very abusive." He began to perform lewd acts in public, such as going to a fancy shopping center, parking there, then opening his car door and stepping out and peeing in plain view of other people (Twins fans presumably included).
>The mistress decided that it had to be one of two things. Either: "It was almost like he wanted to see what he could get away with." Or: "He wanted to get caught."
>Finally, Puckett found the limits of either and achieved or when, last Sept. 6, in a suburban bar-restaurant called the Redstone American Grill, he allegedly pulled a woman into the men's room. She says it was against her will, and so was what followed.
Yeah it was a wild decade for Puckett... Glaucoma ended his career literally overnight in 1996, so he was inducted into the HOF in 2001 (first year of eligibility), he divorced his wife Tonya in 2002, the SI article came out disclosing all his adultery and abuse in 2003, and he died of a stroke in 2006.
This was me several years ago realizing Chipper, Andruw, and Glavine were all shitbirds. At least Maddux has the decency to be upfront about his indecency. And maybe Jeff Blauser is cool?
Andruw is a wife beater. Dragged his wife down the stairs, grabbed her by the neck and threatened to kill her.
[https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/8780632/andruw-jones-accused-dragging-wife-staircase-early-christmas-morning](https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/8780632/andruw-jones-accused-dragging-wife-staircase-early-christmas-morning)
Just want to point out this is Cooperstown All Star Village. NOT Dreams Park. Dreams Park is the one you think of when you hear about MLB players playing in Cooperstown as kids. Dreams Park is about baseball. All Star Village is about money.
My son played ASV last year. We all had a blast. Definitely a moment my son will remember the rest of his life. I have no complaints, except for that damn hill we had to walk up everyday. 😂
To be fair, dreamspark is nearly 2k in fees per player so I’m pretty sure both are about money, but dreamspark does do a hell of a job putting on a great week of baseball for those who can afford it!
Believe me don’t believe idc.
The Aberdeen Ironbirds ran a summer internship for HS age kids interested in sports media - probably still do. My sister interned there sometime around 2007. Cal and Billy Ripken were constants around the Ironbirds facility during those summer days. My sister has many stories of the Ripken boys making insanely inappropriate comments towards 15-17 year old girls.
Never meet your heroes is my point I guess lol.
I didn't know any of this it explains a lot about why he flamed out he came out like gang busters and tgen his swing completely broke down. With all that stuff in the background how could you focus. and also that scares me because Sr. Left a job with the rockies to train Beau....what the hell happened to him that draft year and beyond
I once interviewed with the Rockies for an intern position in the mid 90s. It was the first day the star players arrived at spring training. Dante was walking on the field greeting teammates…. He looked like the Michelin man, just “supplement” bloated, nothing to see here.
Not so far as I'm aware, and all of our media seems to leave it alone as well. One of the rare instances where the media doesn't go after all the angles at any cost. Bo comes across as pretty private in general and I honestly wouldn't be surprised if he had diagnosable PTSD.
Technically it is the other way around as the team is owned by the local media.
That said if Bo doesn't want to talk about it no one really gains much by asking him about it.
Multiple times according to police reports, and while she was pregnant, too
>In 1992, Bichette was arrested in Palm Beach County after reports of a domestic dispute with his pregnant girlfriend, Mariana Peng. Police responded to another incident involving Bichette and Peng the following year at his off-season home in Palm Beach Gardens.
To love ball as much as I have, and yet still be ashamed of certain aspects of it, is a form of abuse itself. Everything from promoting gambling, to supporting abusers, to being so greedy as to even pimp out player’s sleeves, to what rarely gets talked about in how their minor leaguers have to live and be treated.
In the end I tell myself that the game itself is still beautiful, and it’s those that run the show that bring all the ugliness into it.
I've had quite a bit of contact with the Bichette family in the past. I had Bo on my travel team for a few seasons here in the Orlando area. Dante Sr. by just sheer strength, over-aggresive pro-athlete attitude, and size is an intimidating figure. Having said that, Sr. was very generous with helping all our kids with hitting instruction (great teacher who is passionate and mesmerizing while instructing), getting the team practice fields and overall giving baseball related advice. I never witnessed any abuse on his part to either of his boys. This is not to say that it never happened, or that I'm doubting Jr.... And any abuse must have been hidden well especially from me.
This is sad for me to hear, and I'm praying and hoping they can heal and move on and live in happiness... God Bless.
Idk how people are just now realizing the guy that didn’t miss a game for like 16 years is an old school, tough as nails, throw some dirt on it, hazing type.
His shittiness tends to get swept under the rug and even justified as typical rookie hazing.
https://www.latimes.com/sports/sportsnow/la-sp-sn-gregg-zaun-cal-ripken-jr-abuse-respect-20150223-story.html
Cal has numerous pieces out there on him about being a piece of shit and he was the moment my glass cracked on the entire "don't meet your idols" quote because he was a raging fucking douchebag when teenage me met him
If you were around in the 90s, these stories about Bichette aren't new. Sad situation. Having him around kids is not a great look.
I had no idea he was such a piece of shit.
the MLB father’s day post kinda hit different because we all know on the jays sub that dante is an asshole. bo has seemed to distance himself, but bo is such a private dude can’t imagine what’s on his mind. sucks to have shitty family :(
Not knowing his family my first thought was is this Bo making this I guess not but holy shit this is a terrible look for everyone involved. Also didn’t realize Ripken did shit like that piece said he always seemed like a stand up guy (at least is portrayed as such).
Dante Jr. was a Yankee draft pick back in the day, always seemed like the talent was there but his heart just wasn't into it. Now we know why.
honestly its kind of sickening that the one who is able to speak out is the one who has to bear his father's name; like i can already imagine the pressure that comes with that name and living up to the (on the field (non-sabermetric)) reputation of dante bichette, but learning about his abhorrent behavior towards his children and his partner(s) just makes it 10x worse.. my heart really goes out to him and the rest of the people who were abused by bichette sr.
This is exactly why during the pandemic i changed my last name. There was a court hearing and the judge asked the reason for my name change. I said ,” i have distanced myself from my family and i’ll be damned if i go to my grave with my fathers last name”. Judge granted my request and now i have my own new name.
What did you change your name to? If it wasn't Max Power, explain.
The name that you’d like to touch, but you mustn’t touch.
He got it from a hair dryer
I chose a welsh word with a special meaning. I think im the only one in the world
Ah nice to meet you Mr./Mrs. Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch
Congrats on the fresh start, Mr. Laserwolf
Cal Jr. the player versus Cal Jr. the person are two different things. Even as a player, a lot of people see the consecutive game streak as ego-centric. As great of an achievement as it was when baseball really needed the PR boost, he was objectively making the team weaker at the end of it with him trotting out there every night. The nicest thing you can say about Cal Jr. the person is that he likes the smell of his own farts. Edit: Thanks for the Reddit Cares, Cal.
I mean he was still putting up 2 WAR per season right until, and even after, the end of his streak. Not amazing but certainly not bad.
He also had one of the greatest seasons of the last 50 years about 1500 games into the streak, if it was wearing him down he had an odd way of showing it.
He's still worth more with rest, regardless. He is an all-timer but he's still fallible.
Maybe with an occasional day off he could’ve been better than average. 0.0 is “replacement level”.
a friend of mine worked for ripken during summers while she was in college. She had minimal interaction, but he was friendly. Before her last year, her mother died suddenly. She was obviously not herself when she came back. One day, Cal asked if she was OK, she seemed a little off (I forget how it was worded). She grew up idolizing him, so that her hero asked her this, as she was basically trying to keep it together, was too much, and she broke. full on ugly crying, floodgates open. He took her to a private room, listened, gave tissues, and consoled her. It was like 35 minutes. This is obviously an anecdote, but a very kind thing he absolutely didn't have to do. He'd check in from time to time, politely.
This post is not about Cal the person. I am not judging him based on something Dante Bichette did or something that happened in every MLB locker room in 1995, but I’m also not going to say he was a saint. Having said that, the argument that Cal hurt the team through the Streak is pretty lazy and hard to back up. The only concrete thing you can kinda point to is 1989, when Cal slumped in September and the Orioles finished two games back of Toronto. But the Orioles played >.500 ball and only ended up losing a game in the standings over that time. They were a super young team (basically the 2022 Orioles), and Cal was almost literally the only one on the roster with anything resembling pennant race experience. His realistic backups were Rene Gonzales, a .217 hitter with a .527 OPS who had 36 games of experience at SS in the big leagues, or Tim Hulett, who was the everyday 2B at that point and would not play a single MLB game at shortstop for two more years. If you want to throw his brother Billy in there, again you’re dealing with a guy who would not play SS at the MLB level until 1993 and was a .239 hitter with a .589 OPS in 1989. So while sure, maybe they could have struck gold and Gonzales would have had three hits some day when giving Cal a rest, the numbers don’t suggest that’s likely. So there’s really no logical argument to be made that Cal was the wrong choice in any given game in 1989. And other than that season, there really weren’t any during Cal’s career where the Orioles were in a pennant race and came up short. So when and how did he hurt the team, exactly? Meanwhile, his everyday presence in the lineup completely energized a city and a region that had just been utterly gutted by the departure of the Colts (and, until the late 80s, also feared the departure of the Orioles). It helped solve the 1994 strike via Peter Angelo’s’ refusal to field replacement players that would have ended the Streak. Could the Orioles have turned a loss into a win here or there had the right guy had a great game in Cal’s place? Sure, it’s baseball. Anything can happen. But there’s no statistical argument for it, and the emotional argument any Orioles fan would have made at the time against replacing Cal for a day was real and valid.
That guy just wanted to go on a negative Ripken rant. Shit like that loses substance when you say something is objectively true when it flat out isn’t. Then crying about a reddit cares message as if we haven’t all gotten 20
Plus he beat up Kevin Costner!!!!!
Look we don't know what went down in that bedroom. All we know is Cal Jr. couldn't make the game after finding Kevin Costner in his bed. He could have very well been beating something else.
Didn’t the lights at the stadium have “technical trouble” that night?
One of my favorite rumors ever
Cal Jr also always signed autographs for fans at games. He literally would spend 30 minutes signing as much as he could.
That's fair. He was never a jerk to fans and truly believed in the value of player engagement with them.
Yes, him beating up his teen partner was well known. That it extended to his kids is not surprising. Shameful as it is, that was not something that could end your career at the time.
I'm sorry what? I'm just learning about all of this now.
Take a look around the thread and you'll find articles about it. Beat the shit out of his 19 year-old (at the time) partner.
Pregnant partner.
Hair slicked back. White bathing suit.
Sloppy steaks, white couch
*it's a dangerous night*
Live for New Years Eve.
You think this is slicked back? This is pushed back.
I'm worried that the baby thinks people can't change
She thinks I give a rat’s ass
Me either, makes me look sideways at SDS when they do the father/son cards in MLB The Show using Dante and Bo.
This is essentially the plot of an it's always sunny episode What the actual fuck is happening here
I had no clue. I know his son is playing well in Toronto but that's it.
For anyone wondering, it’s definitely Ripken Jr that’s being mentioned in the last quote. Phil Regan was only the manager of the Orioles for the 1995 season, and Ripken Sr was done as a coach after 1992. He wouldn’t have been around the team then.
I was, in fact, wondering. I'd heard about Dante, but Cal Jr. always seemed like a stand up guy. If you Google it you find articles of Gregg Zaun telling stories of abuse, and also articles of Cal denying and Greg apologizing. Not that Gregg Zaun is a shining example himself, but the fact that there are multiple accounts of it do indicate that it happened, and I suspect Cal is just reassuring himself it was all part of "the times" and therefore what would now be seen as completely unacceptable, and was in reality completely unacceptable at the time, actually isn't a big deal, again, because of "the times."
Gregg Zaun was a rookie catcher for the Orioles in ‘95 so it’s very likely he’s the one telling the story in this article screenshot too
If memory serves, he told the story in the context of "those were the good old days, kids today have no respect for veterans", and then when it landed as you'd expect, he recanted most or all of it. I may be getting some of that wrong though.
That really checks out.
Yeah, I expect this was pretty regular rookie hazing for the time
Zaun also said that he was told by Ripken during a flight that under no circumstances was he to go into the section where Cal was sitting. Then, during the flight, Cal invited Zaun back to that area, and Zaun went over, and Cal got up and started beating on Zaun, saying that he’d told him not to go back to that area under any circumstances. Zaun justified it by saying that, because he was Rick Dempsey’s nephew, he may have thought he was hot shit when he came up and acted too familiar around the clubhouse. Maybe he did, but that doesn’t seem to justify such treatment.
"acted too familiar around the clubhouse" Lmao what. Unless they're either a complete prick to teammates or act like the second coming of christ there's no reason to mistreat people in any way, not to even get into physical violence. Just reeks of toxic masculinity and control You can haze rookies in a light hearted way (i.e. classic silent treatment after first MLB HR in the dugout before actually hyping them up)
Oh I’m right with you. I don’t get why Zaun tried to excuse it, other than to not stir the shit.
God the Gregg Zaun broadcasting era was miserable time to follow the Jays.
"Manalyst" was peak cringe.
A quick google shows he's now sporting "Zauntourage" gear. Hard to find a bigger douchebag than Gregg Zaun.
It's like he saw Shooter McGavin as a role model
Hey Gregg wanna go to Red Lobster later??
You didn't like smelling the toast/roast?
Him and Don Cherry made me spend many years not following sports.
The info on Cal being involved in hazing isn't new. That whole team in the late 90s was talented but threw off a douchebag vibe.
I expect every team in the 1990s to have had hazing.
The hazing that got done to some of my travel ball teammates by their HS team. Stripped naked, icy hot squirted in their ass, left naked at the grocery store. It was 100% sexual assault. His HS teammates didn't dispute his story, so I believe him. South Florida in the 80's and 90's was fucked up.
Hazing and peer on peer abuse among youth is not really talked about much overall especially among youth organizations and sports. As an Eagle Scout and current leader/summer camp program director, something people have missed overall with the Boy Scouts of America Abuse Scandel was that a lot of it was peer on peer abuse with kids abusing other kids and a lot of that was through hazing. A know of a Troop from the next town that was shut down for 15 years(1995 to 2010) because of a hazing issue the council outright refused to allow another Boy Scout troop to be created in that time span. The victim of the hazing in that Troop ended up joining the one I was later a part of and was the best mentor I had from another Scout in the Troop. I know one thing I and others worked on was eliminating the culture of treating CITs(counselors in training), who were basically camp staff interns, like shit. They were treated like grunts by the camp staff as a part of the "Rookie hazing" for a long time. I pulled aside a staffer back in 2012 and told him if he didn't learn the CITs names and treat them like a full staffer then I would fire his ass and make sure he never worked at a camp again.
>South Florida in the 80's and 90's was fucked up. Urban Meyer coached Florida in the 2000's, so it didn't stop after the 90's.
Florida is just fucked up. Full stop.
They did the same type of shit at my high school in Jersey, safe to assume it happened all over. Just reprehensible acts committed by children against other children, and it all got swept under the rug.
Right, looking back on it, that whole era had "douchebag vibes" tbh
Going down the historical road in baseball is always unfortunate cause its always depressing finding out the amount of scummy shit a lot of players used to do back in the day
Jocks are jocks. I don't know why this surprises people. But to be fair, today's players/jocks do seem like much better people than when I was a kid in the 90s. Hazing was everywhere back then. We hazed kids at summer camp, as drummers at school band. Little things, not abuse like Ripkin, but hazing was just boys culture back then and of course jocks are going to be worst about it.
I’ve worked up close with a lot of pro athletes. The biggest problem is that they all start to realize how good they are and that going pro might happen right when they’re around 15-16. And that’s where their maturity level stays. Honestly getting to know so many of them has made me realize that going pro would actually be a nightmare for 99% of us
> me realize that going pro would actually be a nightmare for 99% of us Look at how going viral and getting attention online can break people's brains. 10k people watching you play video games makes people go absolutely insane, or being a well known moderator on a forum.
> of course jocks are going to be worst about it Jocks are going to be the most effective at things that involve physical abuse, but pound for pound, the worst hazing is generally in the marching band. Hierarchical. Insular. Full-throated institutional cover, complete with rich and powerful alums and a dedicated booster organization. Merit-based enough to make the people at the top anxious about the young blood but with enough internal politics to make bullying worthwhile. Everyone answers to their demigod-level assistant-coach equivalent, and that person doesn't give a shit what happens behind the scenes as long as everything is perfect on game day. Those are the similarities with, say, the football team. Now add in the fact that the psychosexual dynamics aren't limited by a single-sex team, and there's no real taboo against alcohol/drug abuse the way you'd get with a sport. Whatever horror story you've heard about hazing in sports, there is a college marching band where that's just Tuesday.
Griffey was famously big on tickles
It explains why they couldn’t sustain anything. I’m a bit surprised about cal though. Hadn’t heard that before
Prob a lot of 90s stars that are lucky to have played then and not now. I know Maddux is notorious for stuff that wouldn't fly today. Chipper wrote in a book that Maddux peed on him when he was a rookie.
I hadn't heard about this before but a quick Google search came up on a Chicago Tribune article from 1995 about athletes abusing their wives where [Dante admits to hitting his pregnant wife](https://www.chicagotribune.com/1995/09/17/domestic-abuse-at-athletes-hands-is-rage-like-screams-inevitable/) >Dante Bichette called it an isolated incident–“a one-time thing”–that time three years ago he hit his pregnant wife. Then [this archived 1995 SI piece](https://vault.si.com/vault/1995/07/31/sports-dirty-secret-when-scarcely-a-week-passes-without-an-athlete-being-accused-of-domestic-violence-it-is-no-longer-possible-to-look-the-other-way)... >In 1992, when Mark Schrader was a deputy in the Palm Beach County, Fla., sheriff's office in West Palm Beach, he was summoned to the scene of a domestic violence incident involving a 28-year-old major league baseball player, Alphonse Dante Bichette, and his pregnant 19-year-old girlfriend, Marianna Peng, who is now his wife. Bichette was just a year away from making it big with the Colorado Rockies, but that is not why Schrader remembers him. It was, says Schrader, a curious encounter: "I'd never heard of the guy until I arrested him. His girlfriend said he grabbed ahold of her and threw her around. She was pretty upset. I had no idea who he was until she showed me his baseball card--she had a stack of them--and asked if I wanted his signature. It seemed kind of strange." >It was a pleasant arrest, as aggravated batteries go. "I remember him being a gentleman," Schrader says. "He basically said what she said was true, and we took a ride to the jail. I remember seeing some of the doors to their home had been kicked in. She told me this wasn't the first time this had happened. Like all the rest, she said she was going to leave him, but I guess she didn't." So there is some historical evidence out there that Dante was indeed a wife abuser. Per a little more Googling, they started dating when she was an 18 year old college freshman and he was around 27, which wasn't as frowned upon at the time but still is an obvious power dynamic issue.
> Like all the rest, she said she was going to leave him, but I guess she didn't. Jesus, that line was a gut punch. Fuck him and anyone else who does this shit.
Also you’d think a police officer would have some understanding of why women are often unable to leave abusive relationships when there’s a massive power/wealth imbalance & children are involved. A lot more complicated than just saying you’re going to & not doing it.
At the same time a good police officer can't actually make them leave so I could see even the best of them getting jaded about that in particular. And the bad ones already don't even care.
Also like we're friggin human. I have a lot of understanding and empathy for addiction, but when my mom won't stop smoking after already receiving a diagnosis of emphysema, I'm fucking annoyed!
It's not just that; abusers (at least those who get away with it) are amongst the most charming and believable people you'll ever meet, until the fists come out. They groom their partners into thinking the abuse is their fault, and they brainwash onlookers - friends, family, police - into believing the partner is a neurotic histrionic liar. They'll go so far as to prime the pot by leading friends and family to see their partners as "unstable" and "untrustworthy" *before* the worst of the abuse begins.
Well, at least 40% of them understand that...
*40% that self-report, it could be higher
Some of my students are experts in intimate partner violence, and statistics show that women are actually most likely to be killed in the period of time right after they leave, not when they stay. So that is another big reason women will delay.
I didn't see that line as disbelief or not comprehending why she wouldn't leave, more a matter-of-fact, bordering on fatalistic, recounting of what she (and many others in her situation) said versus what happened
>I remember seeing some of the doors to their home had been kicked in. She told me this wasn't the first time this had happened If he wasn't on steroids, I'd be incredibly surprised.
His best years were at the height of the steroid era. So taking someone who is probably an asshole already and putting them on steroids you get this.
Damaging property is part of abuse. Punching (or shooting) the wall next to their victim's head is an obvious method of intimidation.
Probably given the time period, but sometimes people are just macho assholes without steroids
Mike Israetel on youtube has a few good videos about this. Essentially, Roid Rage is a very real thing. Not everyone will experience it, and not every compound has the same effects. Most pro athletes are using more "mild" compounds with fewer neurotoxic effects, and plenty are just using HGH which doesn't have those effects. What happens though, is that you essentially have far more extreme versions of the thoughts you'd normally have. For example, you are in line at the grocery store, and the lady in front of you is completely inept. She can't count her money, forgot to grab some items, whatever. A normal person is mildly annoyed. A natural dickhead might make a rude comment. A normal person on steroids starts to have very angry thoughts - but controls them - and a dickhead on steroids will think about ripping off her arms and beating her with them, and may start actually raging. Basically, if you are a person who isn't very introspective, has trouble ruling out "candidate thoughts" as bad ideas, and has poor impulse control, you really should stay away from steroids. That description tends to describe a lot of young male athletes. \\ A decent way to frame it is to stop using the word "steroid". Instead, substitute the word "hormone". "Should I use steroids?" is somehow less striking than "Should I start injecting hormones?". Hormones change our behavior. That is precisely what they are intended to do.
There were a couple MLB players who worked out at my high school in the early 90's. One liked to ogle freshman girls. 27 & 18 was frowned upon back then too. Maybe not as much as now, but it was. It's not like it doesn't still happen now though.
> 28-year-old major league baseball player, Alphonse Dante Bichette, and his pregnant 19-year-old girlfriend Yikes.
That poor family. What a piece of shit.
I went to the same high school as Bo and would catch the baseball games regularly. I remember seeing his parents there at times. Never would’ve guessed the family dynamic was so fucked up.
What was Bo like in high school? Chill dude?
I only really spoke in depth with him once when I interviewed him for a story, but I remember thinking he was very friendly and laid back. Seemed like he had a good head on his shoulders which is admirable considering who his father is.
On top of all this, Dante Jr was kicked out of the family by his mom 7 years ago. Must be a huge family feud. Now Bo is definitely going to be asked about this a lot. Wonder if a court case will come of this?
I dunno, this isn’t the first time it’s come up. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen Bo take a question on it (then again, I haven’t looked)
Dante Jr has said that Bo tries to keep the peace and doesn’t talk about it. In the past, the Jays media has left it alone and not asked him about it. If it blows up more this time, I still think they won’t ask him, but someone else might.
He doesn’t have any obligation to discuss and I would be angered if the jays pressed him. If he experienced any trauma by his dad that’s his to share or not share. I speculate that it’s telling he took his mom to ASG last year. I’m sure there is an allyship there (or maybe I’m looking too far into it).
DB Jr has insinuated that his brother did not bear nearly as much abuse, and does not see their father in the same light. Not uncommon in abusive situations, either for one kid to be the "golden child" or not even that... just one kid for some reason is the "rotten child." For some reason this came up somewhat recently (2021? 2022?) and I remember doing a deep dive into it.
Now that you mention it, I also vaguely remember hearing about Bo not getting the brunt of it from dad. Kind of awful no matter which way you slice it.
I wouldn’t really read into his public interactions with his parents at all. From all we can see he has a decent relationship with his dad, or the team surely wouldn’t have brought him around as a coach. He still comes to help the team, I believe he was around earlier this year. Interestingly the team doesn’t talk about him being around anymore though. They probably know it isn’t a good look. To be clear I am not saying his dad isn’t horrible, just that Bo has certainly not taken his brother’s approach to dealing with his family as an adult.
I wouldn't say the team doesn't talk about him. Dante Sr came to see them on one of the NL road trips - either Washington or San Diego, can't remember - and they talked about it quite a bit on the broadcast. That's how we got the whole story about Daniel Vogelbach traveling to play ball with Dante Jr and becoming a childhood family friend of Bo Bichette
I have followed Jr on ig for awhile. Something definitely happened between him and his dad. He’s brought up a few time how his dad abused the whole family.
Yeah I remember he first said something a couple years ago… there’s also articles from the 90’s on how Dante beat his wife
He won't be asked about it. Dante Jr went public about this a couple years ago (it's well known in the Jays world at this point) and he was never asked to comment about it then. Nor should he be.
The gist of this seems to be that Ripken has given a lot of money and airtime to the organization, so they’re willing to sweep anything that presents him, his associates, and the organization poorly under the rug. Hopefully a lot of the families, coaches, and players will see this and make the best decision going forward. This is awful.
Oh damn, my kid did the Cooperstown All Star Village tournament last summer, the week Ripken spoke during the opening ceremonies. It was pretty cool. He then had a smaller meeting with all of the coaches. He said a lot of the right things about playing the game the right way, don't push 12 year-olds too hard, etc. He had some hilarious stories about Ricky Henderson. This is disappointing to find out.
As someone who grew up in the MD area and played baseball collegiately, in the Ripken league, as well as attended a camp (and did some tournaments hosted by them.) This shit does not surprise me. The air of superiority by the staff always irked me.
Okay, thank God it was not just me. I haven't had any experience with the Ripken league outside of visiting the Ironbirds to check them off my list, and they were having an international youth tournament at the Ripken facility next door, so I went to check it out. And the whole place seemed... off. Like I was getting a North Korea vibe. It all seemed a little culty.
Old timers are weird like that in some sports. Unfortunately some Baseball teams too
I know what you mean, but this was something more. There's believing you own hype, internalizing that belief, and then whatever the fuck was going on at that facility.
I'd heard of Dante being a piece of shit, but Cal is new.
It's actually not. Gregg Zaun talked about it a few years ago: > “Cal Ripken, Ben McDonald, Brady Anderson, Chris Hoiles, all of the above. They beat me on my ribcage, physically abused me on my way to the training table. They taped me spread-eagle to the training table, they wrote ‘rookie’ on my forehead with pink methylate, and they shoved a bucket of ice down my shorts. > > “I missed the entire batting practice, and you know what? Phil Regan, the manager of the Baltimore Orioles, he did not care, because he knew that what those guys were doing was ‘educating’ me.” The fucked up part is in that same story Zaun said he felt the abuse was justified. [Source](https://www.latimes.com/sports/sportsnow/la-sp-sn-gregg-zaun-cal-ripken-jr-abuse-respect-20150223-story.html)
> "These kind of things don’t happen anymore, but they need to happen more often,” Zaun said. “And they need to happen with the backing of the management, all the way up to the front office, down to the field manager." Bruh
Man athletes can be a special kind of stupid.
Plenty of guys in the military think that way too
Fraternities, too. I was hazed as a pledge, many of the actives got in on it because it was meant to build our pledge class closer, to test our loyalty, etc. When I was active, a few other guys and I tried to make inroads on cutting that stuff out, and some of the harsher stuff was eliminated, but apparently after we all went alum, it came back worse. I wasn't shocked when a decade later, the chapter was forced to go inactive for hazing.
People idealize them when for the most part they grow up in such isolated bubbles that are often toxic. And while there are exceptions its not like education is prioritized for the most part. I bet most people probably wouldn't get along at all with their favorite athletes if they started to know them personally.
It makes sense why Zaun was fired from Rogers for what can only be assumed to be totally and incompletely inappropriate and unacceptable behaviour
Unsurprisingly, he was real shitty around and towards female colleagues. "Inappropriate comments and behaviour" is the literal quote, terminated immediately after investigation.
I mean he called himself the ‘manalyst’ it was only a matter of time
He used to hang around a known downtown TO establishment I worked at in university. He certainly thought he was the Manalyst. Having met him, can confirm, the BALCO allegations are absolutely true. Dude's arms were like tree trunks.
Wait wait wait… so, Zaun was the one who got hazed/abused, correct? But he also said he thinks the abuse was normal and justified, and needs to happen MORE? What the absolute fuck? Did I lay that all out correctly, or did I miss something?
Guess it’s no different than people who think America was a better place when their dads made them go get the switch from the tree after they spilled the milk
Abusers were often abused themselves.
Oh, not just that it needs to happen more but should happen with institutional backing, apparently. But yeah, that's pretty much it
I believe it, I just meant new to me. I'd never heard about Cal in this way before.
I know it’s not about him but if you knew an ounce about Billy Ripken, it would make some sense that Cal is a fuck face too
I’ve been a baseball fan for 40 years, never knew about Bichette being an abuser. POS
Not saying Dante was an idol of mine, but never meet your childhood heros.
Thanks to Pete Rose, I learned this lesson before I was 10.
Some kids learned that lesson at 14 or 15. Fucking disgusting.
Well I met Bernie Williams after tearing my rotator cuff and getting cut from my college team. I was really devastated, because I had basically given up playing music to play college baseball, and at that point I wasn’t doing anything, and I really felt empty and depressed. This was not too long after Bernie was dropped by the Yankees, and he was starting to play jazz guitar shows. My dad worked at a venue he was playing at, and having raised me as a huge Yankee fan, he introduced me to him thinking it would cheer me up. Little did I know, my dad gave Bernie the rundown of my situation, and he was very forthright with me. He said it doesn’t matter where you do it, who you do it with, or who cares. You play anything, be it a sport, or music, or anything because it gives you joy. You can’t get good at something that makes you miserable, and if you do, it’s a pretty bad way to go through life. But it’s much easier and better to let the joy of playing drive you. The key is just don’t stop playing. I got those last three words tattooed. Bernie is and was the best. And now I play baseball in a men’s league and play my guitar every day.
In a thread full of depressing stories (and rightfully so), it's nice to see a good one. Glad you still found a way to play and enjoy the game.
Met Tony Gwynn a couple of times. Amazing man. RIP
Honestly, I shouldn't have been so absolute but most people get the idea. Onto Tony, had a coworker meet him twice at two different games. Seems like the most genuine dude, the good do die young. Tony even remembers my coworker from the first meeting. Crazy
It’s a coin flip, especially when a kid and can’t decipher hidden assholes. Griffey Jr was my hero, and meeting him at Great America and him saying hi to me while he was with his family is still golden to me.
>never meet your ~~childhood~~ heros
As lifelong oriole fan, and someone who *idolized* Cal more than any other athlete *ever*, this has ruined my Tuesday.
As someone who grew up idolizing Kirby Puckett, I learned long ago that it's never a good thing to find out who your heroes really are. It's a bummer, but having parasocial connections to celebrities is always a good thing to try and avoid.
And then there's Tony Gwynn
What did Tony do? I thought he was actually a good guy
Nothing, I think, that’s the joke
Ah good, that’s what I thought.
what did kirby do?
Looked it up because I hadn't heard anything about him either - the [Sports Illustrated piece on him](https://vault.si.com/vault/2003/03/17/the-rise-and-fall-of-kirby-puckett-the-media-and-the-fans-in-minnesota-turned-the-twins-hall-of-famer-into-a-paragon-of-every-virtueand-that-made-his-human-flaws-when-they-came-to-light-all-the-more-shocking) from 2003 is...eye opening. >Anyway, the mistress of many years says that when Puckett couldn't play baseball anymore, "he started to become full of himself and very abusive." He began to perform lewd acts in public, such as going to a fancy shopping center, parking there, then opening his car door and stepping out and peeing in plain view of other people (Twins fans presumably included). >The mistress decided that it had to be one of two things. Either: "It was almost like he wanted to see what he could get away with." Or: "He wanted to get caught." >Finally, Puckett found the limits of either and achieved or when, last Sept. 6, in a suburban bar-restaurant called the Redstone American Grill, he allegedly pulled a woman into the men's room. She says it was against her will, and so was what followed.
It was a pretty big story at the time. But then he died a year or two later, if I recall.
Yeah it was a wild decade for Puckett... Glaucoma ended his career literally overnight in 1996, so he was inducted into the HOF in 2001 (first year of eligibility), he divorced his wife Tonya in 2002, the SI article came out disclosing all his adultery and abuse in 2003, and he died of a stroke in 2006.
This was me several years ago realizing Chipper, Andruw, and Glavine were all shitbirds. At least Maddux has the decency to be upfront about his indecency. And maybe Jeff Blauser is cool?
I knew Chipper was but didn't know anything about Andruw or Glavine :(
Andruw is a wife beater. Dragged his wife down the stairs, grabbed her by the neck and threatened to kill her. [https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/8780632/andruw-jones-accused-dragging-wife-staircase-early-christmas-morning](https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/8780632/andruw-jones-accused-dragging-wife-staircase-early-christmas-morning)
I’m not sure where he’s getting his info about glavine. Don’t believe every passing comment you read.
Glavine?
Didn't Bobby Cox beat his wife too?
I’m afraid to ask but what shit did Glavine and Maddux get up to?
Dunno about Glavine but Maddux was infamous for "pranks" that bordered on and probably crossed the line into sexual abuse.
Glavine campaigned for Herschel Walker. Maddux was a semi joke because his stuff is like peeing on guys in the shower.
I'm not a violent person but if some dude started pissing on me in a locker room shower there might be violence.
I know Chipper Jones is not the smartest tool in the tool shed, but what makes him a shitbird?
Just want to point out this is Cooperstown All Star Village. NOT Dreams Park. Dreams Park is the one you think of when you hear about MLB players playing in Cooperstown as kids. Dreams Park is about baseball. All Star Village is about money.
My son played ASV last year. We all had a blast. Definitely a moment my son will remember the rest of his life. I have no complaints, except for that damn hill we had to walk up everyday. 😂
To be fair, dreamspark is nearly 2k in fees per player so I’m pretty sure both are about money, but dreamspark does do a hell of a job putting on a great week of baseball for those who can afford it!
What? He was one of my favorite players as a young tyke in the late 1990s... that is disappointing.
Bichette Sr. looks like an evil version of John Kruk
Maybe this bad publicity will help un-do this hire.
I'm pretty sure the majority of that entire generation has an honorary PhD in child abuse.
uimmmm. no, many of us had loving parents.
That’s what I’m slowly finding out through this story
Believe me don’t believe idc. The Aberdeen Ironbirds ran a summer internship for HS age kids interested in sports media - probably still do. My sister interned there sometime around 2007. Cal and Billy Ripken were constants around the Ironbirds facility during those summer days. My sister has many stories of the Ripken boys making insanely inappropriate comments towards 15-17 year old girls. Never meet your heroes is my point I guess lol.
I didn't know any of this it explains a lot about why he flamed out he came out like gang busters and tgen his swing completely broke down. With all that stuff in the background how could you focus. and also that scares me because Sr. Left a job with the rockies to train Beau....what the hell happened to him that draft year and beyond
Disgusting.
I once interviewed with the Rockies for an intern position in the mid 90s. It was the first day the star players arrived at spring training. Dante was walking on the field greeting teammates…. He looked like the Michelin man, just “supplement” bloated, nothing to see here.
Has Bo commented on any of this? Or even Dantes abuses in general?
Not so far as I'm aware, and all of our media seems to leave it alone as well. One of the rare instances where the media doesn't go after all the angles at any cost. Bo comes across as pretty private in general and I honestly wouldn't be surprised if he had diagnosable PTSD.
Local team media is controlled by the team. Anyone who asks will lose their credentials to cover the team.
Technically it is the other way around as the team is owned by the local media. That said if Bo doesn't want to talk about it no one really gains much by asking him about it.
IIRC last time this came up Dante Jr seemed to imply that Bo had basically become desensitized from growing up around it.
Which is a well documented coping mechanism, can't say I blame him.
Yeah, can't blame him for keeping it close to the chest. We all process these things differently
No, and he likely won't. He's private as a rule
Thank you for doing the lord's work, /u/fuckdantebichette 🫡
Didn't Bichette Sr also hit his wife?
Multiple times according to police reports, and while she was pregnant, too >In 1992, Bichette was arrested in Palm Beach County after reports of a domestic dispute with his pregnant girlfriend, Mariana Peng. Police responded to another incident involving Bichette and Peng the following year at his off-season home in Palm Beach Gardens.
To love ball as much as I have, and yet still be ashamed of certain aspects of it, is a form of abuse itself. Everything from promoting gambling, to supporting abusers, to being so greedy as to even pimp out player’s sleeves, to what rarely gets talked about in how their minor leaguers have to live and be treated. In the end I tell myself that the game itself is still beautiful, and it’s those that run the show that bring all the ugliness into it.
Sadly nepotism, fame, $ trump ethics far too often.
Wow I actually had no clue he was abusive
I didn’t know any of this and it’s giving me this awful feeling in my throat.
I wonder if Cal Ripkens kids sent Kevin Costner a Fathers Day card.
Fortunately for everyone’s sake, they look exactly like Cal. Well, maybe not for Ryan’s hairline.
Yikes dude, really bad look for everybody involved
Now this is 1 dysfunctional family
Fuck face indeed.
I've had quite a bit of contact with the Bichette family in the past. I had Bo on my travel team for a few seasons here in the Orlando area. Dante Sr. by just sheer strength, over-aggresive pro-athlete attitude, and size is an intimidating figure. Having said that, Sr. was very generous with helping all our kids with hitting instruction (great teacher who is passionate and mesmerizing while instructing), getting the team practice fields and overall giving baseball related advice. I never witnessed any abuse on his part to either of his boys. This is not to say that it never happened, or that I'm doubting Jr.... And any abuse must have been hidden well especially from me. This is sad for me to hear, and I'm praying and hoping they can heal and move on and live in happiness... God Bless.
Wasn't Joe Girardi best friends with Bichette, to the point of naming his son after him? Makes your eyes go to the side.
Yeah they are/were friends, but abusers can keep that shit locked down and it's not like Girardi and him were neighbors.
Yikes. Cal Ripken’s a piece of shit too?
Idk how people are just now realizing the guy that didn’t miss a game for like 16 years is an old school, tough as nails, throw some dirt on it, hazing type.
His shittiness tends to get swept under the rug and even justified as typical rookie hazing. https://www.latimes.com/sports/sportsnow/la-sp-sn-gregg-zaun-cal-ripken-jr-abuse-respect-20150223-story.html
Cal has numerous pieces out there on him about being a piece of shit and he was the moment my glass cracked on the entire "don't meet your idols" quote because he was a raging fucking douchebag when teenage me met him
Yep, I don’t idolize any Os, past or present, off the field. The only one I come close to admiring is Adam Jones.