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\n Seattle Mariners outfielder Randy Arozarena has issued an apology to teammate Cal Raleigh following heated comments made after Raleigh declined a handshake during World Baseball Classic play. The teammates have resolved their differences ahead of the upcoming season opener.\n <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Seattle Mariners outfielder Randy Arozarena has issued a formal apology to teammate Cal Raleigh following a heated exchange that stemmed from a declined handshake during World Baseball Classic competition.<\/p>\n
\u201cI understand that with Opening Day a few days away, I don\u2019t want it to be a distraction. Cal and I have talked and I apologized for what I said after the game,\u201d Arozarena stated in a release from the Mariners organization. \u201cNothing in the WBC takes away from the fact that we are brothers and teammates. He\u2019s family, and we are both focused on helping the Mariners win the World Series.\u201d<\/p>\n
The controversy began during a March 9 matchup where Team USA defeated Mexico 5-3. When Arozarena extended his hand toward Raleigh, who was positioned behind home plate in his catching gear, Raleigh chose not to reciprocate the gesture.<\/p>\n
Following the game, Arozarena spoke with Mexican reporter Luis Gilbert in Spanish, stating that Raleigh \u201chas to thank God that he has nice parents, well educated,\u201d while mentioning he had recently embraced them during a cordial encounter at their team hotel.<\/p>\n
The Cuban-born player, who moved to Mexico before launching his MLB career, then used vulgar slang terms to criticize Raleigh before switching to English and making additional crude remarks about his teammate.<\/p>\n
Raleigh quickly moved to defuse the situation, referring to Arozarena as a baseball \u201cbrother\u201d and clarifying that no animosity existed between the two players.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love Randy, I do,\u201d Raleigh expressed. \u201cI hate that this is a thing. There\u2019s no beef when we get back to Seattle. He\u2019s my brother. We\u2019re family.\u201d<\/p>\n
Following their weekend spring training contest, Raleigh reinforced that the matter had been resolved.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe talked it out, and everything went great,\u201d Raleigh told MLB.com. \u201cRandy knows that I love him, and he\u2019s a brother, and it\u2019s in the past and none of us are carrying this forward. We\u2019re in a good spot.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Mariners are set to begin their regular season Thursday in a matchup against the Cleveland Guardians.<\/p>\n
Seattle enters the new campaign following their breakthrough 2023 season, which saw them capture their first American League West division championship since 2001. Raleigh played a crucial role in that success, joining just six other players in major league history to reach the 60-home run milestone in a single season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Seattle Mariners outfielder Randy Arozarena has issued an apology to teammate Cal Raleigh following heated comments made after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":638447,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2392],"tags":[75638,75639,5,75632,75640,75634,75635,75633,75636,620,4,619,65,3235,75637],"class_list":{"0":"post-638446","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-seattle-mariners","8":"tag-102-3","9":"tag-102-3fm","10":"tag-baseball","11":"tag-fine-day","12":"tag-fine-day-102-3","13":"tag-fine-day-fm","14":"tag-fine-day-media","15":"tag-fine-day-radio","16":"tag-have-a-fine-day","17":"tag-mariners","18":"tag-mlb","19":"tag-seattle","20":"tag-seattle-mariners","21":"tag-seattlemariners","22":"tag-weller-radio"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116276831077897126","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=638446"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638446\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/638447"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=638446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=638446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=638446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}