Have you ever heard the term "stick to baseball"? Fans love to throw it around to journalists and athletes on social media whenever they share something non-baseball related.
For Toronto Blue Jays reliever Anthony Bass, now would be the best possible time to tell him to stick to baseball. The pitcher took to Instagram to share a post suggesting that he endorses an anti-LGBTQ boycott of Target.
This stems from a recent issue surrounding Target stores. The chain began stocking clothing LGBTQ+ clothing as a part of their Pride Month celebration, but were forced to begin pulling them off of the shelves after people began to complain that some of them were "satanic" and sending inappropriate messages to children. These same people entered Target stores to complain to management and destroy some of the displays.
Regardless of what is wrong or right and regardless of what you personally may believe in, this is a social issue that Bass should've kept himself out of. This is the very same pitcher who took to Twitter to complain that his pregnant wife was forced to pick popcorn up off of the floor ... that her own daughter dropped. This is another one that can be viewed from different angles, but the hurler was forced to delete his Twitter account after the mass amount of hate mail he was receiving.
So here he is, down to one form of social media, and he just can't find a way to keep his nose clean. His inability to keep his name out of the headlines for all the wrong reasons is likely becoming a PR nightmare for the Blue Jays.
Pair this with his relatively poor performance on the mound this year, and one may believe that releasing Bass outright would be the best move to make here. The 35-year-old sported an ERA north of 7.00 throughout the entire month of April before finally beginning to turn things around. This unforutnate turn of events may force him out of a job, as it's becoming increasingly difficult for the Blue Jays to ignore him and his big mouth off the field.
While the Blue Jays' lack of depth has been well-documented to kick off the 2023 campaign, there are a few relief pitchers in Triple-A that could easily come up and replace Bass on the roster, with Jay Jackson being the top candidate for such a spot.
At least there are some people out there in the Twitterverse who can have some fun with Bass' latest bout of self-destruction.