February 2012

The Nationals’ “Take back the Park” thing turns down right stupid

by @ Hardball Talk

Remember how the Nationals launched an initiative to keep Phillies fans from taking over their ballpark during Nats-Phillies series?  How they won’t sell tickets to people not from D.C., Virginia or Maryland?

I think that’s kind of pointless and silly because (a) it’s not like the secondary ticket market doesn’t exist; and (b) money is money and last I checked the Nats weren’t filling their park with locals anyway.  If they want Phillies fans to be drowned out, win ballgames and sell more season tickets. But whatever, it’s their show, and if they want to say no to someone when they go to buy a ticket, it’s their choice.

But it’s another thing altogether, it seems to me, to renege on tickets they already agreed to sell to Philly people before the policy was put in place. And that appears to be what they have done.

Seems that in December a Philly company called Integrated Project Services, Inc. contacted the Nationals for a group outing, put in order and paid a deposit which guaranteed the tickets.  They were supposed to get final confirmation of where their seats were and stuff in January. Then:

It was almost the end of January, and neither Kate or Chuck had heard a thing from the Nationals about their tickets. “we had tried to contact the Nationals because we thought by the end of January we were suppoesd to know,” McCorriston said. “So we called and emailed and called and called and emailed and called, this had been going on for two and a half weeks, and they finally just notified us and said ‘well sorry, we have to take back our park, you know, you can’t have the tickets, there aren’t any tickets left, and we’ll refund your deposit. That was it.”

Just an idiotic business decision to address a problem — too many Phillies fans in the park — that, while slightly embarrassing, is not exactly the sort of thing that a sophisticated business should really care about.  And it’s the sort of thing that could lead to a lawsuit, so that’s great too.

Win some baseball games, Nationals. That’s how you take back your ballpark.

Source: Hardball Talk

Wisconsin man who collected Ryan Braun’s urine sample issues statement “to set the record straight”

We all know where I stand on this whole fiasco. Braun got away with one and has done nothing but cry a river about how he was a “victim” and the system was “fatally flawed” ever since his suspension was tossed out.

By all accounts, the seal on the sample was intact and the delay did not change the sample one iota. But it apparently was the game-breaker, and Braun, with his tone in his news conference, not only threw the sample custodian under the bus, but drove over him four or five times. Remember, this was somebody approved by Braun’s own union.

Well now the man who collected his samples has spoken out. And once again, Braun looks worse than he did the day before.

From Hardball Talk’s :

Dino Laurenzi, the Wisconsin man who was in charge of Ryan Braun‘s urine sample, issued the following lengthy statement following the overturning of Braun’s suspension:

On February 24th, Ryan Braun stated during his press conference that “there were a lot of things that we learned about the collector, about the collection process, about the way that the entire thing worked that made us very concerned and very suspicious about what could have actually happened.” Shortly thereafter, someone who had intimate knowledge of the facts of this case released my name to the media. I am issuing this statement to set the record straight.

I am a 1983 graduate of the University of Wisconsin and have received Master Degrees from the University of North Carolina and Loyola University of Chicago. My full-time job is the director of rehabilitation services at a health care facility. In the past, I have worked as a teacher and an athletic trainer, including performing volunteer work with Olympic athletes. I am a member of both the National Athletic Trainers’ Association and the Wisconsin Athletic Trainers’ Association.

I have been a drug collector for Comprehensive Drug Testing since 2005 and have been performing collections for Major League Baseball’s Joint Drug Prevention and Treatment Program since that time. I have performed over 600 collections for MLB and also have performed collections for other professional sports leagues. I have performed post-season collections for MLB in four separate seasons involving five different clubs.

On October 1, 2011, I collected samples from Mr. Braun and two other players. The CDT collection team for that day, in addition to me, included three chaperones and a CDT coordinator. One of the chaperones was my son, Anthony. Chaperones do not have any role in the actual collection process, but rather escort the player to the collection area.

I followed the same procedure in collecting Mr. Braun’s sample as I did in the hundreds of other samples I collected under the Program. I sealed the bottles containing Mr. Braun’s A and B samples with specially-numbered, tamper-resistant seals, and Mr. Braun signed a form certifying, among other things, that the specimens were capped and sealed in his presence and that the specimen identification numbers on the top of the form matched those on the seals.

I placed the two bottles containing Mr. Braun’s samples in a plastic bag and sealed the bag. I then placed the sealed bag in a standard cardboard Specimen Box which I also sealed with a tamper-resistant, correspondingly-numbered seal placed over the box opening. I then placed Mr. Braun’s Specimen Box, and the Specimen Boxes containing the samples of the two other players, in a Federal Express Clinic Pack. None of the sealed Specimen Boxes identified the players. I completed my collections at Miller Park at approximately 5:00 p.m. Given the lateness of the hour that I completed my collections, there was no FedEx office located within 50 miles of Miller Park that would ship packages that day or Sunday.

Therefore, the earliest that the specimens could be shipped was Monday, October 3. In that circumstance, CDT has instructed collectors since I began in 2005 that they should safeguard the samples in their homes until FedEx is able to immediately ship the sample to the laboratory, rather than having the samples sit for one day or more at a local FedEx office. The protocol has been in place since 2005 when I started with CDT and there have been other occasions when I have had to store samples in my home for at least one day, all without incident.

The FedEx Clinic Pack containing Mr. Braun’s samples never left my custody. Consistent with CDT’s instructions, I brought the FedEx Clinic Pack containing the samples to my home. Immediately upon arriving home, I placed the FedEx Clinic Pack in a Rubbermaid container in my office which is located in my basement. My basement office is sufficiently cool to store urine samples. No one other than my wife was in my home during the period in which the samples were stored. The sealed Specimen Boxes were not removed from the FedEx Clinic Pack during the entire period in which they were in my home. On Monday, October 3, I delivered the FedEx Clinic Pack containing Mr. Braun’s Specimen Box to a FedEx office for delivery to the laboratory on Tuesday, October 4. At no point did I tamper in any way with the samples. It is my understanding that the samples were received at the laboratory with all tamper-resistant seals intact.

This situation has caused great emotional distress for me and my family. I have worked hard my entire life, have performed my job duties with integrity and professionalism, and have done so with respect to this matter and all other collections in which I have participated. Neither I nor members of my family will make any further public comments on this matter. I request that members of the media, and baseball fans, whatever their views on this matter, respect our privacy. And I would like to sincerely thank my family and friends for their overwhelming support through this difficult time. Any future inquiries should be directed to my attorney Boyd Johnson of Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP.

And just for good measure, Jeff Passan of Yahoo! Sports phoned the FedEx shipping center in question and, drum roll please…the sample would have just sat there until Monday morning anyway!

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