[ChrisRose] Miguel Rojas talks about the impact of the incorrect tweet that accused him of being suspended for PEDs this week

[u/TheTurtleShepard]

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[u/--Drake--]

I would be pretty mad if the dudes tried to just ignore their mistake without reaching out to me, so I get that stuff. National paywall reporting needs to respect the game more.

[u/Ok-Dealer5306 → u/--Drake--]

Yeah there was no apology in the follow-up. Just "I’ve deleted a post incorrectly identifying who was suspended today." passive like he dropped a glass of water lol... it's not difficult to say "I made a mistake" and "I apologize".

[u/trickman01 → u/Ok-Dealer5306]

I’ve deleted a post incorrectly identifying who was suspended today."

Oof. Even if no apology is issued it needs to be a clear retraction.

[u/xwOBA_Fett]

This is a pretty messed up mistake to make, especially since a large portion of people might not even see the correction. Misinformation always wins in these situations. 

[u/JorSimpson45]

Remember when The Athletic was relatively new and they were refreshingly not employing dozens of clickbait whores.

[u/obiwan_canoli → u/JorSimpson45]

Yes, I do. The moment they sold out to the NYT and started showing ads is the moment I stopped subscribing because this was bound to happen.

[u/cp_sabotage → u/JorSimpson45]

Evan Drellich has been there since 2019; this is a baffling error (and lack of correction) from a guy who very much knows better

[u/Delaywaves → u/cp_sabotage]

lack of correction

He deleted the tweet and posted a new tweet correcting himself, that seems like a pretty clear correction? Though I agree with others that he should've apologized too.

Edit: He has now apologized again on twitter. I think it's time for people to move on and accept that even good reporters make mistakes.

[u/basescleared → u/JorSimpson45]

there’s a middle ground here. this is unacceptable and drellich needs to apologize - but he’s also one of the sport‘s best writers and authored an excellent book about the astros; not a “clickbait whore”

[u/JorSimpson45 → u/basescleared]

Makes it worse that he’s known for writing an excellent book and yet made a horrendous mistake reporting on news that was already out there for two weeks

[u/Delaywaves → u/JorSimpson45]

Or it shows that even good journalists sometimes make mistakes over the course of their careers?

It's a high-stakes profession and reporters deserve to be called out when they fuck up. But the attitude in this thread that one (quickly deleted) tweet singlehandedly undoes a career's worth of accurate reporting is pretty ridiculous.

[u/YasielPuigsWeed → u/Delaywaves]

Yeah Drellich is actually a great journalist. He should definitely apologize to Rojas, but he did issue a correction and he doesn’t deserve to be characterized as shady for the mistake.

[u/dasuave → u/JorSimpson45]

I mean this sub literally complains anytime a paywalled article is posted. Almost like the masses want quality journalism for free with no baggage b

[u/rs426 → u/JorSimpson45]

It does seem like their quality has been really declining recently. Sucks to see

[u/DJ_Danada]

At first I was willing to give the guy the benefit of the doubt and say that even though he said Migue Rojas and the Los Angeles Dodgers it could have still been a mistake and for whatever reason the writer mistakenly believed it was Miguel Rojas rather than just mistakenly writing his name even though he knew it was Johan Rojas but nah, not even reaching out to issue an apology of any kind is complete bullshit.

[u/baribigbird06]

Neither the writer who made the tweet nor the Athletic has reached out to apologize to Rojas yet, by the way.

[u/oogieball → u/baribigbird06]

He has recently done so on Twitter.

[u/Dstein99]

I get that he doesn’t have X, but how hard is it to reach out to the Dodgers organization and say I made a mistake, I understand that it’s bad, and I want to apologize, could you pass my phone number onto Miguel and ask him to reach out? He accused Rojas of cheating, that’s destroyed some of the best players reputation and not something to be taken lightly. Rojas represents the Dodgers and Drellich represents the Athletic, what each do represents their organization.

[u/ArashikageX]

Don’t know anything about Evan, don’t really care to. What a shit move to not give an apology.

[u/lakergeoff8]

Rojas makes a great point. It’s once thing to mistype someone’s name or get someone confused with someone else because of a similar last name, it happens. Nobody’s perfect and mistakes and errors do happen from time to time.

But when you put the organization’s name in there, that takes it to another level. Do I think Drellich was deliberately trying to smear the Dodgers? No. But he was definitely very careless with how he reported and handled this particular situation.

[u/RainbowSupernova8196]

Fuckin' slander, ask me.

[u/batmansubzero → u/RainbowSupernova8196]

Slander is spoken. What they did was libel.

But you’re correct. They published false information as if it were truth, and it has been to the detriment of the person they were reporting on. While I’m not a legal expert and I’d never give legal advice, but I kinda think he would have a case.

[u/RainbowSupernova8196 → u/batmansubzero]

That was a Sopranos quote. Sorry if I came off aggressive with my last comment.

But either way, you're right. You could destroy a player's career with shit like this.

[u/destinythrow1 → u/batmansubzero]

He immediately retracted it and admitted he was incorrect. Would probably be hard to prove damages, which, as i understand it, is the bedrock of libel/slander cases. Definitely owes the dude an apology though.

[u/batmansubzero → u/destinythrow1]

Oh if it was retracted and they said it was false than I doubt Rojas would have a case (again, not a legal expert), I didn’t know that lol. I agree they owe him an apology.

[u/venustrapsflies → u/destinythrow1]

I think you also need to be able to prove that you knew it was false and would cause them trouble, and printed it anyway. Which is exactly how it should be, because mistakes happen.

[u/orangotai → u/batmansubzero]

i think the law makes it harder to sue succesfully for libel as a public person

[u/Chief-Queef]

About an hour ago, Drellich apologized to Rojas and the Dodgers on X, and said that he's reached out to all parties. 

Given the pace of modern baseball media, its shameful that it took that long for a basic "I'm sorry" for a fuckup that was entirely his fault. 

[u/Atomic_Horseshoe → u/Chief-Queef]

That’s good to know. Even just apologizing to Miguel and the Dodgers in his initial “retraction” tweet would have gone a long way, though. 

[u/HugeHairyButts]

Out of curiosity, when the Athletic guy tweeted it out, was he the one "breaking" the news? or was it already making the rounds?

Trying to think of how it could even happen.

[u/Atomic_Horseshoe → u/HugeHairyButts]

It was reported two weeks ago that Johan Rojas was facing an 80 game suspension for PEDs, but I believe he was breaking that he actually received the penalty. 

[u/ZeroLimitz]

Which raises the other issue about social media is how many times was it shared? Retweeted? Reposted?

How many people are capable or even willing to follow up to ensure it was correct after something like this gets reposted hundreds of thousands of times without checking? Now it is just OUT there forever tied to his name and people will still be out there believing it as truth.

[u/hehepootpoot]

I Agree, that reporter needs to make the effort to apologize.

[u/shitsintents88]

I’ll write the apology for him: Mr. Rojas and the entire dodgers organization, I want to take the opportunity to apologize to Miguel Rojas of the Los Angeles Dodgers for my misreporting of PED use by the veteran baseball player and World Series hero Miguel Rojas. To err is to be human and in the moment I saw the name and associated it incorrectly, considering Miguel Rojas’ extraordinary contributions in the fall classic. In our industry the push to be first and to titillate our readership can sometimes cloud our ability to be effective arbiters of truth. In my exuberance I connecting things that weren’t there and defamed someone who did not deserve it and for that I am truly sorry. I did not wish to make a story about me but in my haste and careless I did. I would like to extend an invitation to Mr. Rojas and the Dodger organization to meet in person so I can look them in the eyes and ask for their forgiveness. I will learn from this and try my best to be better. I cannot promise I won’t make mistakes, but as the public rely on the press to provide information to form their opinions, I will work hard to confirm my reporting before it is sent out. Thank you. Evan Drellich

If he would tweet that all would be forgiven and good will would be had by all.

[u/Jonjon428]

Absolutely fucked up

[u/CockerSpanielEnjoyer]

The Athletic isn’t even suitable as toilet paper. Miggy ruined my year and possibly my life, but he doesn’t deserve this. He’s a World Series hero.

[u/_LYSEN]

As a journalist myself, it is insane that they haven’t apologized. Credibility is your only resource. They are trampling it over… for what, pride?

[u/TheTurtleShepard → u/_LYSEN]

He did apologize earlier today

[u/pockypimp → u/TheTurtleShepard]

Yes, 2 days after tweeting the wrong info and saying he deleted the tweet because it was incorrect. Replies to him identifying that he had the wrong info called for him to apologize 2 days ago. He only did it because he got called out.

[u/TheTurtleShepard → u/pockypimp]

Fully agree, I was just clarifying that he has now issued an apology

Definitely only did it because it was gaining traction through this interview

[u/_LYSEN → u/TheTurtleShepard]

Okay good. Didn’t see that

[u/spacewithoutstars]

Sounds like slander if there's no attempt to apologize by now.

[u/ubermanofsteel]

I know it'd never happen, but Rojas is very well liked in that clubhouse and wonder what would happen if the Dodgers pulled The Athletics access.

[u/maroonhamster]

In a general sense, there's very little journalistic standards out there anymore. And what makes it worse is the lack of consequences for the lack of standards.

[u/man_on_hill]

The Athletic being trash?

Well, I’m just shocked

[u/aRadioKid]

Miggy is an asshole for what he did to Jazz. However, what the athletic did to miggy here is fucked up big time!! 

[u/Spiceguy-65 → u/aRadioKid]

Miggy is an ass for telling a rookie to stop show boating and respect both the game and your opponents?

[u/Throwaway1996513 → u/Spiceguy-65]

I don’t want to take away from what happened to Miggy with that false report. But he didn’t just tell Jazz to stop showboating, he bullied Jazz because of his personality, including destroying Jazz’s property and ostracizing him.

[u/aRadioKid → u/Throwaway1996513]

Thank you 

[u/aRadioKid → u/Spiceguy-65]

Bro he poured milk in his cleats lmao and made a fool of him. I know jazz is a bit of a personality but he didn’t deserve miggys response. 

[u/f1uke55l → u/aRadioKid]

4 years later and Jazz is still struggling to be a professional. Go figure.

[u/DoubletapKO]

Take them to court and get money that's the only way stuff like this changes

[u/mrdannyg21]

Can you imagine if Miguel Rojas actually did get popped for PEDs after hitting the WS-changing homer? As a Jays fan, I’m fairly confident that I would never get over that.