MESA, Ariz. -- After spending the last six months biting his tongue about his feelings toward Milton Bradley, Cubs general manager Jim Hendry ripped into his former player Wednesday morning at HoHoKam Park.
Hendry called Bradley's implication to ESPN that he received hate mail from within the organization "absolutely ridiculous," and said Bradley needs to look "in the mirror" and accept responsibility for his poor 2009 numbers.
"We're all brought up in life to accept responsibility when we fail, and to judge people by how they act and how they carry themselves when things don't go well," Hendry said.
Listen to the entire Hendry interview:
Bradley told ESPN some of the hate mail he received had no postage, suggesting it could've been in-house.
"Obviously, that couldn't be further from the truth," Hendry said. "I think maybe it's time Milton looks at himself in the mirror. It is what it is. He just didn't swing the bat. He didn't get the job done. His production, or lack of (production), was the only negative."
Photo: In happier times, Jim Hendry introduces Milton Bradley in January 2009. (Phil Velasquez/Tribune)
Hendry said people drop off mail at the front desk at Wrigley Field, which could explain why there was no postage on the alleged hate mail. He added that Bradley never mentioned the claim to anyone in the organization, and that the Cubs said the organization "couldn't have bent over backward any more than they did for the entire season, before (the suspension) in St. Louis."
Hendry was also upset that Bradley told ESPN that Piniella should've apologized to him in front of the team after their incident during a Cubs-White Sox game at the Cell last June, instead of simply apologizing to him personally and through the media.
Asked about the remark, Piniella said: "I apologized to Milton. Listen, I did the best I could, and I'm human like everybody else. I think I bent over backward to make it as comfortable as I possibly could, and that's all I can do, nothing more, nothing less."
While Hendry played the bad-cop, Piniella was the proverbial good-cop, taking the high road and asking everyone to "move on."
"Look, the thing with Milton is, it's behind us," he said. "I'm concerned about this year's team. We've got good chemistry here, we're getting ready for a championship season and that's all I'm concerned with. Anything else in the past, we've just got to go forward."
Piniella said he didn't know "why we keep re-visiting these things," and declined to get into a war of words with Bradley.
"I guess we can talk about the Los Angeles Lakers, we can talk about the Chicago Bears and the players they got," he said. "I think we let this subject go and concentrate on what we have here, and not re-visit it any more. I don't think there's any need to."
Hendry denied Bradley's claim that African-American players have a difficult time playing in front of Cubs fans at Wrigley Field unless they are Hall of Fame caliber players.
"We have a lot of players from a lot of countries and a lot of nationalities that love playing here," Hendry said. "I think it's the total (cop-out) when you don't perform up to the expectations that are expected of you, (then) blame it on a variety of different excuses."
"We have a long history of quality people that want to play here, and I don't believe in the last seven or eight years under this regime we've lost a free agent player that we wanted to keep," he said. "And that's still the case. We just heard (in the media) from Aramis (Ramirez) and Derrek Lee the other day how strongly they would like to end their careers here. I do find it ironic, too, that if there was any truth to any of the things that are coming up now about (the difficulties of playing at Wrigley Field),
"I'd like to think that Kevin Millar and Marlon Byrd, who are represented by the same firm, the Levinsons... I don't think they would've been dying to have their clients come here. I think Kevin and Marlon will both tell you we were clearly their first choice. It's really unfortunate you get to that situation (and) deflect the lack of production you did in the year you were here, and t6hen try to use the other areas for excuses."
Hendry again accepted the blame for signing Bradley to a three-year, $30 million deal, repeating that it was his "mistake" and his alone. He thought he helped Bradley by sending him to a situation where he could thrive, only to see Bradley rip the Cubs in separate interviews with ESPN and the New York Times.
"I think we've all done our best to move on," Hendry said. "We've got a great bunch of guys here and a really quality thing going in our clubhouse and our organization. We thought we helped Milton move on too, by putting him in another place. And that's how we approach it.
"It's time to go about our business. Obviously, it was a one-year situation that I brought him in here to try and help us from the left side. Obviously it was a mistake and he didn't get the job done. You move on from your mistakes and you make life better for both sides, and that's what we did."
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SIMPLY PUT, MILTON BRADLEY IS THE WORST KIND OF PRO ATHLETE THAT EXISTS, BUT SHAME ON YOU JIM HENDRY FOR OPENING YOUR YAP AND SAYING ANYTHING BUT FOR INSTANCE................"I'M SORRY TO THE CHICAGO CUB FANS FOR MY INABILITY TO LISTEN TO OUR FANS AND MEDIA ALIKE, WHEN IT WAS CONSTANTLY AND AGRESSIVELY SUGGESTED ON AT LEAST 1000 TIMES THAT WE SIGN ADAM DUNN, RAUL IBANEZ, OR BOBBY ABREU FOR THE 2009 SEASON INSTEAD OF MILTON BRADLEY."
You know what? Hendrey signed this fool, so now he can weather this fool's drivel.
There is a reason that Bradley has played for 76 different teams in the past 8 seasons. He's an A$$. Hendry took a chance on him and it failed.
Now it's coming back to haunt him.
I laughed when they announced this deal.
I laughed all thru last season when this fool tanked.
I'm laughing now as this fool continues to get his digs in on the organization stupid enough to pay him $30M.
Hendrey, you earned this, now enjoy the legacy of signing this fool!!!!!!!!!!!! (I sure am!!!)
Maybe he needs to be "beaned" in the head. Then maybe his brain will "re-set' to normalcy.
".... I never heard Dempster suggest that Cubs fans hate Canadians, or Heilman suggest that Cubs fans hate Jews..."
I'm sure Heilman did not suggest this if for no other reason than he is not Jewish. He's a Notre Dame grad who I'm presuming is Catholic.
John Grabow, however, is.
Every player handles a horrific slump a different way. Bradley's way is to play the race card when 2 or 3 drunken morons in a crowd of 40,000 yell something ugly instead of generic displeasure. That's how morons do.
Everyone in the Cubs organization past and presnt should look in the mirror but Bradley more than anyone.
Watch the cuffs bitch.
Just when you think you have whipped-out the cancer, it rears its ugly head. He keeps affecting the clubhouse even after he's gone.
http://sports.espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/news/story?id=4983236
Milton, meet Torii. Torii, meet Milton. It just never ends.
Milton is the T.O. of baseball
Why is this even still worthy of being brought up again? I understand it's spring training and stories are hard to come by but is the best story to keep rehashing? Bradley is nothing more than MLB's version of Terrell Owens, he ends up hating every team he goes to. If you want to end up being the most hated player in Chicago sports history you're doing a good job. Enough of him already.
The race card is a weak out - much like many of Miltons at bats. If Edgar Winter was a cub and he performed and behaved like Milton Bradley - he would get the same treatment - and he is as white as you can get.
If that arrogant *uck ever shows up in Chicago again, I'm gonna break his legs! Then he can complain about how his stellar career was cut short.
Why did Seattle ever sign this guy? Maybe we could work something out and you could have him back in Chicago?
I mean Jason Marquis as the player who was booed who didn't accuse Cubs fans of not liking Jewish players. But Aaron Heilman wasn't exactly loved by Cubs fans either!
The real story here is that Bradley is pretty much spitting in the face of Jackie Robinson and Hank Aaron, two great players who faced real racist threats and not just ones they imagined. Robinson was called every name in the book, spit at, and had objects thrown at him at pretty much every park he went to. Yet he still prevailed. Hank Aaron received numerous death threats as he approached Babe Ruth's home run record, yet he still prevailed. These are strong men who prevailed under hostle circumstances to be all time greats of the game and all time great people in general.
Milton Bradley, to the best of my knowledge, did not have any objects thrown at him, did not have anyone spit at him, and if anyone did call him a bad name it was a few voices in a crowd of 40,000, as opposed to the hundreds and thousands who would do it at Robinson. And I'm sure if people made threats against Bradley's life, like they did with Aaron, we would have heard about it by now.
I really think that in Bradley's mind the booing and the yelling of "you stink" register as race-related and not as performace-related. Cubs fans have booed many under-performing players over the years. Jacque Jones and LaTroy Hawkins are two of those players. So are Todd Hundley, Ryan Dempster (as a closer), Kevin Gregg, and Aaron Heilman. I never heard Dempster suggest that Cubs fans hate Canadians, or Heilman suggest that Cubs fans hate Jews. And if you want to include Dusty Baker and Don Baylor on that list then I will also say that you cannot go a day without seeing some anti-Lou and anti-Hendry comments on this site too.
Hendry is right, Bradley really needs to look in the mirror. He got paid $8 million last season and now is 3,000 miles away. He should be happy he got his money and is now out of a situation he clearly did not like. Instead, he takes any opportunity to bring it up which goes to show he hasn't let it go and the second the fans in Seattle think he's not giving 100% the same things will happen there too. The Mariners have never reached the World Series and they have had a few playoff failures, most notably their 2001 season in which 116 wins got them as far as the ALCS. I doubt they are as patient and as relaxed towards their Mariners as we all think they are and with raised expectations this season, if they don't do it this year expect the 2009 Cubs all over again!
Good riddens to bad rubish.
I hope the ever classy Milton remembers to laminate his pathetic racecard before he wears it out.
Hendry should have just kept it quiet. Acknowledging the interview makes you look defensive. At least he didn't deny that racial taunts occur at Wrigley. It happens at every park in America. Dawson, Williams, Jones, Lee all have said they have heard it. But what separates them is that Bradley can't ignore it like the rest of the guys could (can.)
BTW- nowhere in the interview did Bradley accuse the Cubs of planting the hate-mail. His implication was that fans deliver it to the stadium in person. The media has gone looking for an "inside job" angle that isn't there.
I didn't think he had it in him.
major kudos to the often maligned GM.
I agree with Lou. He's gone and should be forgotten. If I ever hear about him again it will be too soon. A once-was that plays more media-games than ballgames is what he amounts to and that kind of player is not worth the time of a team that desperately needs to focus on the business of playing baseball.
Is anyone honestly surprised that he played the race card? He has in almost every place he's gone too... Which is toooo many places. I'm a doyer fan, and I can tell you he was pathetic. But then apparently Jeff Kent didn't like him cuz he was black. please. Milton, realize this: you're no good anymore. No matter where you go, you make us black people look like little babies who have to blame race when we can't get the job done. I hope the fans in a very WHITE seattle tear you up.
This wouldn't be an issue if ESPN didn't keep asking Milton questions about his time with the Cubs...
When you look at me Jim Hendry, which is too often, just repeat that you have the best job in sports in that no Cub fan expects you to be accountable for the bonehead moves you make.
oh milton...get back to us after you've worn out your welcome in seattle this year cause that will likely be your final stop in MLB
This article is a total waste of brains, time and ink. If you all are sick of Milton Bradley, drop and squash him totally. He's finally gone, so let him STAY gone. Don't bring back the dead. Good riddance!
I'm just glad the sourpuss is in Seattle instead of Chicago now. It's time for members of the Cubs organization to stop answering questions about Bradley. Stop giving the guy new material.
Congratulations, Rod. You were first.
Milton is a cancer whose best years are behind him and have been for awhile now, good riddance
Keep playing the race card cause your a head case and a horrible free agent signing. Its too bad you weren't enought to get Hendry fired. Maybe you should be a little grateful to a team that payed you 10 million bucks. Once Pinella leaves after this train wreck I hope to see Maddux and Sandberg take the reins of this team.
Shame on cubs fans for booing soriano and he would never be as classless as bradley.Soriano deserves better
Wow. Just wow.
He even played the race card. As if the Cubs did not have enough dysfunction last yearby having the longest drought for a WS championship of any team in baseball.