Tag: Trevor Bauer

Dodgers’ Walker Buehler talks Trevor Bauer, Padres and why there’s no complacency in L.A.

SportsPulse: Mackenzie Salmon connected with Dodgers starting pitcher Walker Buehler to see how the team is preparing to defend their title in 2021.

SportsPulse: Mackenzie Salmon connected with Dodgers starting pitcher Walker Buehler to see how the team is preparing to defend their title in 2021.

‘I don’t think you can blame a guy for that’: Dodgers’ Buehler on Trevor Bauer’s fiery presence

SportsPulse: Mackenzie Salmon connected with Dodgers pitcher Walker Buehler to get his perspective on his new teammate Trevor Bauer and if the L.A. has to prove anything after winning the title in a shortened season.

SportsPulse: Mackenzie Salmon connected with Dodgers pitcher Walker Buehler to get his perspective on his new teammate Trevor Bauer and if the L.A. has to prove anything after winning the title in a shortened season.

Noah Syndergaard and Trevor Bauer roast each other in Twitter spat

This escalated quickly.

Noah Syndergaard and Trevor Bauer are certainly no strangers to the use of social media to stir the pot.

And on Friday, the New York Mets pitcher and his Los Angeles Dodgers counterpart traded barbs on Twitter, going at each other pretty nastily, it seemed.

All the background you need to know: Bauer nearly signed with the Mets before choosing the Dodgers, and was thought to have trolled New York fans along the way. Bauer apologized, explaining that some links had mistakenly gone live on his website that shouldn’t have. He added he would donate $10,000 each to charities based in New York.

Got it? That leads right in to Syndergaard’s not-so-thinly-veiled tweet:

Oh boy. Over to Bauer:

Back to Syndergaard:

And more back and forth:

OK then! That escalated quickly!

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You never have to root for guys like Trevor Bauer

Bauer has also tweeted climate change denials, transphobic jokes and is a birther.

The Los Angeles Dodgers signed 2020 National League Cy Young Award winner Trevor Bauer to a $102M, 3-year contract on Friday afternoon, making him the highest paid MLB player in 2021.

Per USA TODAY Sports, the contract has an opt-out clause after the first two seasons and pays Bauer $40 million in 2021 and $45 million in 2022. As far as pitching talent goes, Bauer had a standout pandemic curtailed 2020 season, topping the National League with a 1.73 ERA in 11 starts.

There was never any doubt that Bauer would be highly compensated after becoming a free agent, and only time will tell if the Dodgers screwed themselves with this massive deal. What I can firmly say though, is that despite his great arm and now, bags and bags of money, Bauer remains a deeply unlikeable online troll and harasser, and it’s OK to never root for guys like him.

Over the past few years, Bauer has taken a page out of another sports website playbook and repeatedly engaged in harassment campaigns on social media, turning his hundreds of thousands of followers on people even slightly critical of him. Most notably, Bauer went after a college Houston Astros fan after she tweeted he was her “least favorite person in all sports.”  Bauer barraged her Twitter account with messages, tagging her over 80 times in tweets, repeatedly calling her out even though she had long since stopped responding.

It was gross, despicable behavior that Bauer never apologized for. When pushed by the media, he instead made himself out to be the victim and described the harassment as “good natured.”

Despite his claim that he would be use the platform “more responsibly” Bauer’s continued to invite his Twitter fans to pile on to everyday users as recently as October of 2020, going after a fan who said she didn’t want to see Bauer end up in LA, as well another user  who pushed Bauer on his behavior.

It’s clear that, after repeated attempts at it, Bauer knows exactly what kind of harassment he’s endorsing. Not only does he not care, but seems to revel  in it, glorying in punching down without acknowledging the deep power imbalance he wields as a high-profile athlete.

Harassment is just the tip of the Bauer experience though. He’s tweeted climate change denials, transphobic jokes and thinks Obama wasn’t born in the US.

Not only is his Twitter presence especially toxic, but it’s clear he hasn’t learned anything from his bad behavior nor is he interested in changing. Bauer sees himself as a rebel or an outcast or whatever seems fashionable, but in reality he’s just an unlikable dude who has leveraged the ability to throw a ball.

“I try to make the things that I say be based in reality, based in facts, and truthful,” Bauer says. “And if that’s the case, and you want to be upset at me for stating the truth, that’s your choice. I don’t know if I’m not afraid of sticking middle fingers in people’s faces, or if I enjoy it. But I end up doing that a lot,” Bauer said in a Sports Illustrated profile.

Professional sports has always valued talent over character, and rewarded far more reprehensible behavior than that of Bauer’s steady online outbursts, but that doesn’t mean fans have to stomach it. Yeah, Bauer has a good arm and is going to make Scrooge McDuck money, but you never have to root for a guy who thinks harassing women online is a fan pass time.

Dodgers land LA native Trevor Bauer in free agency

SportsPulse: USA TODAY Sports’ Bob Nightengale breaks down the details of the deal which brings Trevor Bauer home to Los Angeles where he’ll play for the Dodgers.

SportsPulse: USA TODAY Sports’ Bob Nightengale breaks down the details of the deal which brings Trevor Bauer home to Los Angeles where he’ll play for the Dodgers.

Did Trevor Bauer troll Mets fans with his website before signing with Dodgers?

Hmm.

The answer to the headline above is … maybe?

In the hours leading up to the news breaking that ace starting pitcher Trevor Bauer — who won the National League Cy Young award last season with the Cincinnati Reds — was signing with the Los Angeles Dodgers, there were reports were it was down to a couple of teams: the Dodgers (which would bring him home to his native California) or the New York Mets.

And some Internet sleuths started seeing some strange stuff popping up on Bauer’s personal site — a signed Mets hat giveaway, a reference to New York, and a lot more. There was also a signed Dodgers hat … but Mets fans were buzzing about the possibility Bauer would join the franchise.

https://twitter.com/DeeshaThosar/status/1357749371660550145?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1357749371660550145%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thescore.com%2Fmlb%2Fnews%2F2107520

Then, the site crashed … or was taken down:

If you want a summary of how it was for Mets fans and their players, these two tweets from reliever Trevor May and catcher Tomas Nido sum it up:

Well, now Bauer is a Dodger. So what did all that mean? Could he have been trolling, as he’s been known to do with tweets like this back in November?

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Trevor Bauer responds to Ronald Acuna Jr. trash talk with a supercut of Braves strikeouts

The trash talk continues!

It began, it seems, with Cincinnati Reds pitcher Trevor Bauer talking trash to Atlanta Braves fans after his squad was eliminated from the MLB postseason.

Then, the back-and-forth was escalated by Braves star Ronald Acuna Jr., who mocked the Bauer strut from September and told him to “Gooo homeeee.”

Well, Bauer did just that. And when he got home, he tweeted a supercut of Braves strikeouts — one of Acuna is included of course — along with his strut. His caption? “Homeeee.”

It’s a very funny response, but of course all Acuna has to do is to say “Scoreboard.” Instead, he went with “Hahahahahhahahhaa you funny bro.”

This is so good, I want more!

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Ronald Acuna appears to troll Trevor Bauer after Braves eliminate Reds

Acuna got the last word in.

The always-outspoken Trevor Bauer took to Twitter after his Cincinnati Reds were eliminated from the 2020 MLB postseason and trolled Atlanta Braves fans on the way out.

It was during that series that he mocked the problematic and mostly eliminated chop that Braves fans have done over the years, and in September, he was seen on the mound doing the Vince McMahon strut on the mound after a Christian Yelich strikeout (see below).

But now? The Braves’ Ronald Acuna is getting the last word in, and it looks like he’s mocking that Bauer strut right back at the pitcher without actually naming him.

This was the original Bauer strut:

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Trevor Bauer trolled Braves fans about his free agency after the Reds were eliminated

Solid effort.

National League Cy Young favorite Trevor Bauer saw his season to come an end on Thursday as the Atlanta Braves finished off their two-game Wild Card sweep of the Reds, 5-0.

While Bauer did all that he could in Game 1 — pitching 7.2 innings of scoreless baseball — the Reds failed to score a run in the entire series (which isn’t the best strategy). And now, Bauer will enter free agency as one of the top targets in the entire market.

But even in defeat, Bauer did his best to deliver a loss to Braves fans. In a season-ending tweet, Bauer said that his treatment from Braves fans on social media the past two days had turned him off to the idea of possibly signing with Atlanta.

Solid troll, Trevor.

During Game 1 of the series, Bauer mockingly mimicked the Braves’ somewhat-phased-out Tomahawk Chop as he exited the field.

It was playoff trash talk, and I can dig it. But many Braves fans didn’t appreciate that, predictably. And the Braves players seemingly waited to express their rebuttal in the form of a Marcell Ozuna celebratory masterpiece that included a fake selfie 45 feet down the first-base line after a home run.

Back to that tweet, though …

Will Bauer actually turn down a potential offer from the Braves because their fans were mean to him on Twitter? Doubt it because basically every non-Reds fan is mean to Bauer on Twitter. But it was the only dig he had left at the Braves, so you can’t blame him for using it.

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