CC Sabathia obliterates Tony La Russa: ‘Shouldn’t be f–king managing that team’
CC Sabathia didn’t sugarcoat his feelings on the Tony La Russa saga with the White Sox.
The former Yankees southpaw went off on the “R2C2” podcast, ripping the 76-year-old La Russa for criticizing his own player, Yermin Mercedes, for swinging and homering on a 3-0 pitch against a position player in a blowout and then having no issue with the Twins throwing behind him the next day.
“That’s just f—ing stupid. It’s stupid period, I’m sorry,” he fumed. “The s–t is terrible. He shouldn’t be f—ing managing that team, and if you’re not going to step up and have your player’s back, what’s the point of being the f—ing manager of the White Sox? S–t is stupid as f–k, sorry.”
La Russa called Mercedes “clueless” and said he missed a take sign. When Tyler Duffey threw at him the next day, La Russa didn’t have a problem with it. Several White Sox players have supported Mercedes.
“This is what I was telling you when they hired him,” Sabathia said. “He’s just so out of touch with the game and most people are. I sit here and watch Christopher Russo on MLB Network. He’s out of touch with the game. Like Tony La Russa is out of touch with the game. He should not be managing one of the best teams in the American League, period.
“The fact that Tim Anderson, who is basically the captain of their team, had to go on Instagram and step up for his teammate, like, ‘Yeah, the game wasn’t over. If you’re going to put a f—ing position player in there to pitch, guess what? If he’s going to lob s–t over the plate, we going to f–king tee off.’ Put a 10-run rule up there. If ya’ll don’t want to see people get embarrassed and you don’t want to see position players pitch and people swing on 3-0 counts and all that s–t, then make it a 10-run rule so the f–king game would be over and you don’t have these stupid-ass unwritten rules.”