San Francisco Giants Manager Condemns Racist Messages Directed at Pitcher: ‘Completely Unacceptable and Disgusting’
During his pre and postgame press conferences, San Francisco Giants manager Gabe Kapler strongly condemned the racist messages that were recently directed at relief pitcher Jay Jackson.
“There’s no place for racist comments to our players on social media period. They are completely unacceptable. Disgusting,” Kapler told reporters before the Giants-Diamondbacks game in Arizona on Tuesday.
“And not just in baseball, but in society in general. I was really taken aback. I know our entire clubhouse was. We understand that the comments that were made are not at all representative of our incredible fan base. Our fan base is wonderful and especially supportive,” Kapler continued. “It needs to be something that isn’t like, here and gone. It should be discussed because it was really, really disturbing for all of us and it just can’t happen.”
Jackson, who is Black, shared the horrific racist abuse he received on social media Monday night after he gave up three runs in two-thirds of an inning. The Giants went on to win the game in extra innings.
Haha it’s funny to see the amount of stuff people say… I want to see them do what I do… but you right I had a bad game… no one is more pissed for making the team work harder than me… but we won: the boys picked me up. We are in first **fans… enjoy the game, be happy we won pic.twitter.com/YrHodFVcmU
— Jay Jackson (@Jaxland58) August 3, 2021
“Jay is totally open to criticism about his performance,” Kapler added after Tuesday’s game. “But anytime we get racist comments from anybody it’s completely unacceptable and quite disgusting, to be honest with you. And it’s something that our players and our staff in the clubhouse are going to rally around Jay about.”
At 33-years-old, the 2021 season is just Jackson’s third in the Major Leagues. When the 2021 MLB season began, just 7 percent of the league’s players were American-born Black athletes.
Watch above via NBC Sports Bay Area
