While the Major League Baseball continues to investigate published allegations that Mickey Callaway sent obscene and unsolicited messages to five media women, Indians President Chris Antonetti – part of the board that placed Callaway in his first powerful position – said Thursday – your team did not know about this alleged behavior, nor did it receive any formal inquiries from Mets after the fact.
Antonetti, who was Cleveland’s general manager when the club appointed Callaway as their pitching coach in 2013, said at a Zoom press conference: “If we only knew [of such allegations], we would have acted on them. But we didn’t. “
Athletic, which released the history of the complaints, reported that in August 2018, the Mets, during the first of two seasons with Callaway as coach, “learned of an incident that occurred prior to signing [Callaway]”And investigated. The Mets hired Callaway after his fifth season as a pitch coach for the Indians, and Callaway’s first two alleged harassment incidents occurred during his time in Cleveland. Three more reportedly happened while Callaway ran the Mets.
Asked if the Indians had heard about the Mets in 2018 about any of these incidents, Antonetti said: “Not that I know of, no. There was never any complaint against Mickey in his time with us, either to me or to our human resources department or other leaders. “
Mets President Sandy Alderson, who hired Callaway as well as Jared Porter, whom Mets had to fire as general manager less than two months after hiring him after ESPN revealed his harassment to a reporter, said Mets should do a better job selecting candidates. Antonetti supported that.
“We are in the process of forming an internal working group focused specifically on thinking about what we can do to ensure that we are creating not only a safe and welcoming environment, but really inclusive for women, as well as for all under-represented groups organization, ”said Antonetti.
The Angels suspended Callaway as their pitch coach while the MLB investigates him. Antonetti said: “We will not only cooperate fully [with the investigation], but we will support you. I imagine it will happen in the next few weeks. “