Seattle Mariners President and CEO Kevin Mather resigned, announced President and Managing Partner John Stanton on Monday. Mather’s resignation came after a speech he gave earlier this month, in which he made disparaging comments about the English speaking skills of two club members, spoke openly about manipulating the service time of several potential customers and called the longtime man of the team’s third baseman “well paid.” online over the weekend.
“Like all of you, I was extremely disappointed when I heard about Kevin Mather’s recent comments,” said Stanton in a demonstration. “His comments were inappropriate and do not represent our organization’s feelings about our players, team and fans. There is no excuse for what has been said and I will not try to invent one.”
Stanton said that Mather’s resignation takes effect immediately, and that Stanton will assume the roles of president and CEO until Mather’s replacement is found.
Mather has been with the Mariners since 1996 and assumed the roles of president and CEO in 2017.
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Speaking to Bellevue, Washington, Breakfast Rotary Club for an online event on February 5, Mather addressed several topics on the inner workings of the Mariners organization during a 46-minute discussion.
In discussing Julio Rodriguez, a Dominican outfielder ranked second by CBS Sports in the Seattle agricultural system, Mather said that “he has a bigger personality than all of you together. He is tall. His English is not excellent. I will be here in 2021. He won’t be here until 2022 or 2023. A fantastic boy. ”
On Sunday, Rodriguez tweeted an image of his face superimposed on Michael Jordan in the documentary series “The Last Dance” saying “… and I took it personally.”
Mather also complained about having to pay for an interpreter for Hisashi Iwakuma, a former Mariners pitcher who was recently hired as a special mission coach.
“Wonderful human being. His English was terrible,” said Mather. “He wanted to get back in the game. He came to us. Frankly, we want him as our Asian scout / interpreter, what’s going on with the Japanese league. He’s coming for spring training. And I’m going to say, I’m tired of pay for the interpreter. When he was a player, we paid ‘X’ to Iwakuma, but we also had to pay $ 75,000 a year to have an interpreter with him. His English suddenly improved. His English improved better when we told him that. ”
Mather also openly admitted that the team chose not to bring in great prospects like Jarred Kelenic last season, as a way to keep them under the team’s control for a little longer.
“We were not going to put them on the list of 40 men, we were not going to start the service timer,” he said. “There were all kinds of reasons why, if we had an injury problem or COVID outbreak, you must have seen my big belly there in the left field. You wouldn’t have seen our potential customers playing at T-Mobile Park. “
Mather also called third baseman Kyle Seager, who spent his entire career with the team, “probably overpaid”, and said he probably wouldn’t be with the team in 2022. Seager’s wife, Julie, responded on twitter asking if they should put their Seattle home up for sale.
Mather apologized for his comments on Sunday, saying he “had no excuse”.
“I want to apologize to all the members of the Seattle Mariners organization, especially our players and fans. There is no excuse for my behavior and I take full responsibility for my terrible lapse in judgment,” Mather said in a statement. “My comments were mine. They do not reflect the vision and strategy of the Mariners baseball leadership, who are responsible for making decisions about the development and status of players at all levels of the organization.”