On July 30, Danny Wild of MiLB.com wrote a short and sweet article about two Delmarva Shorebirds, Jared Breen and Nick Cunningham, testing positive for GHRP2. I have an update about how Cunningham is spending his 80-game suspension.
While Breen is suffering from the long road to recovery from his accident at Arthur Perdue Stadium on July 3, Cunningham is soaking up the sun in Florida.
What? No es justo. Why? You’ve got some splainin’ to do (guess that show!).
Orioles’ Florida facility, Ed Smith Stadium, is in Sarasota and where Cunningham tagged himself in the Instagram post, Siesta Beach Sarasota, is 7.3 miles apart.
Is it fair to suspend a player then send them to Arizona or Florida for “punishment”? I absolutely do not think so; send them to where they came from, Indiana for Cunningham, with no contact from the club until 10 games from the anticipated due-back date. Or if you’re Cunningham, no contact until that time of the year where Spring Training preparation comes up.
This morning I was able to get in touch with a former Chicago White Sox minor leaguer, Zach Voight (SS/2B, NMSU alumni), about his take on the suspension. “His season is over. His suspension will continue starting the beginning of the full season, which will almost certainly mean that if he’s a prospect, he’ll go to spring training and get all the normal reps and then will stay for extended spring training.” Voight continued with “they will probably send him to the instructional league to make up for the reps he lost at he end of the season. Nothing he could do at the team facility at this time.” Makes sense, honestly.
For Breen’s punishment, it is most likely the 80 game suspension will start once he is off of the disabled list; makes sense as well.
Sad thing is that there have been repeat offenders in the Majors – Jenrry Mejia, Manny Ramirez, Neiti Perez, Guillermo Mota. Will boys ever learn their lesson?
When I coached high school basketball, 2013-2014, one of my girls was late for a home game without reason. Her punishment was no play time for a week (2 games), and had to stay after practice for extra drills for two weeks worth. Cunningham and the rest of the prohibited drug use violators are lucky that I am not in the Major League affairs.