White Sox GM Hahn 'shocked' by ex-reliever Middleton's scathing comments about team culture
The White Sox are making headlines again - for all the wrong reasons.
Creeping to a merciful end of another miserable season, the Sox were greeted by a media mob at Guaranteed Rate Field before Monday night's game against the Yankees.
Reporters didn't flock to the South Side to get reaction after two straight weekend wins over the Guardians in Cleveland. Instead, it was getting reaction to comments made by former White Sox relief pitcher Keynan Middleton, who was traded to the Yankees on Aug. 1 for minor-league starter Juan Carela.
In a story published by ESPN late Sunday night, Middleton had scathing reviews of his four-month stay with the Sox.
"We came in with no rules," Middleton said. "I don't know how you police the culture if there are no rules or guidelines to follow because everyone is doing their own thing. Like, how do you say anything about it because there are no rules?
"You have rookies sleeping in the bullpen during the game. You have guys missing meetings. You have guys missing PFPs (pitcher fielding practices) and there are no consequences for any of this stuff."
White Sox general manager Rick Hahn said he was "shocked" by Middleton's comments.
"Frankly, the first rule of a clubhouse is, 'What goes on in a clubhouse is supposed to stay there.' I'm a big believer in that tenet," Hahn said. "However, where an individual player casts aspersions and puts his name on it, I feel a responsibility to respond. Quite frankly, it's a little bit ironic that Keynan's the one saying this because my last conversation with him, face-to-face, was a week ago in this clubhouse, where he sought me out to apologize for his unprofessional behavior, unprofessional behavior that (manager) Pedro (Grifol) had called him out on and had an individual meeting with him about.
"And Keynan wanted to apologize for it. I told him at the time I figured that was a one-off and not something that anyone needed to get into greater detail of. And he shared he understood there was a trade deadline coming up and that if we moved him, he would be very interested in returning to us as a free agent. So for a number of reasons - the sanctity of the clubhouse, his own personal experience here, as well as what he expressed to me as his future desires - I was surprised to see the report this morning."
Hahn explained some of Middleton's complaints.
"At no point over the course of this year has there been a reliever sleeping in the bullpen during a game," the Sox's GM said. "That's just wrong. We do have a player, a position player, who has fairly serious sleep issues and as part of our sports-performance program of trying to address that issue, he has been given permission and in fact encouraged to sleep in the clubhouse at times. Earlier in the season, a couple of our veteran players approached me, complaining about such behavior. To their credit, they thought they were trying to help the environment and when I explained to them the background of the player and why we were doing that, they relented and understood.
"(Middleton) said a young player missed infield practice and there were no repercussions. We did have a young player miss infield practice, and for the next three days he was out there doing infield practice as extra work as a means of breaking through and holding him accountable for missing the practice and showing the importance of being there. The meeting in Toronto where (Middleton said) only pitchers spoke, that's not true. Andrew Benintendi spoke during that meeting. It was something that's supposed to stay in the clubhouse, but once you open the door and subject us to criticism, we're going to be a little more candid about it."
Middleton was in the opposing dugout Monday night in a Yankees uniform. He was asked about his comments to ESPN.
"I said what I said," replied Middleton, who was 2-2 with a 3.96 ERA and 2 saves in 39 games with the White Sox. "And I stand on that. I believe there's a right way to go about business and to do that, but I honestly don't want to comment anymore on it. I said what I said and I really, truly feel that with my heart."
Grifol said he was also caught off guard by Middleton's comments.
"I was kind of surprised, surprised it came from him," Grifol said. "I think Rick mentioned it, that just prior to him leaving he shared with us how much he wanted to come back. I was kind of surprised."