Featuring: the ongoing broadcast saga, Gibbers and Griffins, and a ton of Mark Shapiro (including comments on Buffalo, Mickey Callaway, Pearson, Vlad, Danny Jansen, the Dunedin complex, and more!)
Good stuff, as always. I love these notes sections, and miss them since the old blog days.
I love watching the games in a game thread, so hopefully we get some regulars once the season starts?
One of the things I don't envy you for, Stoeten, is having to parse through the torrent of corporate, self help, Tony Robbins-esque horseshit vocabulary coming from Shapiro constantly. He's done a good job as Jays president, truly, and seems like a pretty nice guy but Jesus H Christ.
When an MLB player (or any professional athlete) tests positive for steroids, invariably their response is one of innocence. When MLB front office officials are told that one of their employees was involved in sexual harassment, they all seem to claim that they knew nothing about it. I'm not accusing Shapiro or Atkins of anything, but it's beginning to sound like a familiar refrain.
Regardless of whether or not Shapiro actually knew of Mickey Callaway's workplace sexual harassment, Shapiro is still responsible.
There's a reason executives, of sports teams and other workplaces, go on and on about corporate culture and values. It's because they don't know everything that's going on. It's because they rely on middle managers, supervisors, etc., who know what's going on to make decisions. And executives require those decisions to be consistent with the corporate culture and values that they've established.
So, either Shapiro completely failed as a leader in determining and communicating the values that were supposed to guide the decisions of his subordinates in Cleveland, or the values he established tolerated sexual harassment in the workplace.
And now to excuse himself because he didn't have actual knowledge?
And to say this past year has taught everybody the importance equality? As if 2010, when Callaway joined Cleveland, was such a different time?
Or to feel "disappointed" because the VICTIMS didn't come forward, instead of because his subordinates allowed such behaviour to continue?
That's leadership?
Then again, Atkin's also said some of the same "right things," so I guess Shapiro has been successful in establishing his winning culture.
Unfortunately, it took the Harvey Weinstein stuff in 2015-16 to finally become public before we really started to take this seriously. And I'm not saying all cases are the same, obviously there are degrees of bad/terrible/unconscionable behavior. If Callaway was doing all this pre-Me Too, I don't expect Shapiro or Atkins, or frankly almost everyone else in an organization would have handled it differently.
I'm old enough to remember Anita Hill and the Tailhook Scandal, to name just two very public sexual harassment cases, so not at all willing to give people a pass for allowing sexual harassment in the workplace pre-Weinstein.
A quick search to get the dates right shows both the Anita Hill testimony and the Tailhook Scandal were major stories in 1991. This 2011 New York Times editorial looking back on the intervening 20-years says that after Anita Hill's testimony,
"recognition of the issue grew and tolerance of harassment in workplaces and on campuses shrank. The law changed, too...In the past two decades, many companies have started training programs to deter sexual harassment."
According to Wikipedia, Shapiro was first hired by Cleveland in 1991. Made GM in 2001. President in 2010.
If Shapiro didn't take any of this seriously before 2015, then he should be ashamed of himself. Regardless of when "we" started to, as a senior executive in Cleveland since 2001, he should have taken this seriously well before Callaway was hired and promoted through the ranks of his club.
Man, feel bad for Valera. Not only missed out on a legit playing opportunity but also, I assume, didn't collect a pay cheque while restricted. Hope he gets a shot
That's a good point. Here's an explainer on the restricted list that says clubs in certain situations may choose to still pay players, but I have no idea if the Jays did this for Valera or not (and couldn't find a reference to it, though I didn't exactly do an exhaustive Googling of it). https://www.thecubreporter.com/book/export/html/3544
Any update, its been a week...
Will have something up shortly.
Good stuff, as always. I love these notes sections, and miss them since the old blog days.
I love watching the games in a game thread, so hopefully we get some regulars once the season starts?
One of the things I don't envy you for, Stoeten, is having to parse through the torrent of corporate, self help, Tony Robbins-esque horseshit vocabulary coming from Shapiro constantly. He's done a good job as Jays president, truly, and seems like a pretty nice guy but Jesus H Christ.
When an MLB player (or any professional athlete) tests positive for steroids, invariably their response is one of innocence. When MLB front office officials are told that one of their employees was involved in sexual harassment, they all seem to claim that they knew nothing about it. I'm not accusing Shapiro or Atkins of anything, but it's beginning to sound like a familiar refrain.
PR is an industry like any other.
Regardless of whether or not Shapiro actually knew of Mickey Callaway's workplace sexual harassment, Shapiro is still responsible.
There's a reason executives, of sports teams and other workplaces, go on and on about corporate culture and values. It's because they don't know everything that's going on. It's because they rely on middle managers, supervisors, etc., who know what's going on to make decisions. And executives require those decisions to be consistent with the corporate culture and values that they've established.
So, either Shapiro completely failed as a leader in determining and communicating the values that were supposed to guide the decisions of his subordinates in Cleveland, or the values he established tolerated sexual harassment in the workplace.
And now to excuse himself because he didn't have actual knowledge?
And to say this past year has taught everybody the importance equality? As if 2010, when Callaway joined Cleveland, was such a different time?
Or to feel "disappointed" because the VICTIMS didn't come forward, instead of because his subordinates allowed such behaviour to continue?
That's leadership?
Then again, Atkin's also said some of the same "right things," so I guess Shapiro has been successful in establishing his winning culture.
Unfortunately, it took the Harvey Weinstein stuff in 2015-16 to finally become public before we really started to take this seriously. And I'm not saying all cases are the same, obviously there are degrees of bad/terrible/unconscionable behavior. If Callaway was doing all this pre-Me Too, I don't expect Shapiro or Atkins, or frankly almost everyone else in an organization would have handled it differently.
I'm old enough to remember Anita Hill and the Tailhook Scandal, to name just two very public sexual harassment cases, so not at all willing to give people a pass for allowing sexual harassment in the workplace pre-Weinstein.
A quick search to get the dates right shows both the Anita Hill testimony and the Tailhook Scandal were major stories in 1991. This 2011 New York Times editorial looking back on the intervening 20-years says that after Anita Hill's testimony,
"recognition of the issue grew and tolerance of harassment in workplaces and on campuses shrank. The law changed, too...In the past two decades, many companies have started training programs to deter sexual harassment."
https://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/22/opinion/sexual-harassment-20-years-later.html
According to Wikipedia, Shapiro was first hired by Cleveland in 1991. Made GM in 2001. President in 2010.
If Shapiro didn't take any of this seriously before 2015, then he should be ashamed of himself. Regardless of when "we" started to, as a senior executive in Cleveland since 2001, he should have taken this seriously well before Callaway was hired and promoted through the ranks of his club.
Jansen answer was interesting for skipping past Reese McGuire...
Oh, you're right! I meant to point that out actually!
Man, feel bad for Valera. Not only missed out on a legit playing opportunity but also, I assume, didn't collect a pay cheque while restricted. Hope he gets a shot
That's a good point. Here's an explainer on the restricted list that says clubs in certain situations may choose to still pay players, but I have no idea if the Jays did this for Valera or not (and couldn't find a reference to it, though I didn't exactly do an exhaustive Googling of it). https://www.thecubreporter.com/book/export/html/3544