Former Cleveland Indians pitcher Cliff Lee was accused of "mailing it in" by ESPN's Colin Cowherd who said a source told him Lee hated Texas, had already mentally fit himself for Yankee pinstripes and offered his lackluster performance Saturday in Baltimore as proof. Lee vehemently denies the accusations. Lee tells Jennifer Floyd Engel of star-telegram.com those accusations are lies. "Write that. Are...
Former Cleveland Indians pitcher Cliff Lee.Former Cleveland Indians pitcher Cliff Lee was accused of "mailing it in" by ESPN's Colin Cowherd who said a source told him Lee hated Texas, had already mentally fit himself for Yankee pinstripes and offered his lackluster performance Saturday in Baltimore as proof.
Lee vehemently denies the accusations. Lee tells Jennifer Floyd Engel of star-telegram.com those accusations are lies.
"Write that. Are you writing? Write that it's a lie. I did not say that and nobody close to me would say that. Either say who the source is or shut up because I am saying it is not true."
What little I know about Lee is the dude is not the mail-it-in type, or how else do you explain him not bailing on any of those games where the Rangers gave him like 1/2 run of support. And as one Ranger player practically noted, giggling at the absurdity of those three little words, nobody mails anything in during a contract year, and frankly it is a chicken thing to say about an athlete. Especially with so little corroborating evidence.
"Why?" I heard Cowherd explain on local four-lettered radio. "[Lee] doesn't care about Baltimore. And he doesn't care about Texas.
"When he pitches against elite teams, he is showcasing his talent. 'Here I am. I still got it'. [Saturday] against the Orioles, he mails it in. That is a dude that gets out town the second the season ends. He'll get out of town, go to the Yankees and jettison the Rangers."
Floyd Engel doesn't believe Cowherd. Neither do we. But it seems that someone (or some area) has a motive.
Cowherd would have to be a complete idiot to go live viral with a figment of his imagination. Whoever deep throat is, he sounds very New York-ish, with talk of Lee wanting to be "a Yankee or with an elite team." The intimation being the Rangers do not fit that definition.