‘It was just certain people’
HOUSTON — Astros utilityman Mauricio Dubón didn’t want his postgame digs at his former San Francisco Giants team to be misunderstood by his ex-teammates.
After his three-hit game Monday, which included a go-ahead RBI double, Dubón had said of the Giants, “They didn’t treat me right over there,” but he explained to the San Francisco players via group text that he had misjudged his words and he didn’t mean to include them in his swipe.
“They knew where I was coming from,” Dubón said before Tuesday’s game. “They were fine. Those guys are like my family. There are guys over there I still talk to every day. It was just certain people.”
Dubón said he “misjudged his words” and has not named names. He said after Monday’s game that his issues stemmed from his playing time, which is typically determined by the manager with input from the front office. Asked to be more specific about what had bothered him about his playing time, Dubón said, “It was more just communication.”
Giants manager Gabe Kapler was aware of Dubón’s comments, and his first response was to praise him. “I’m happy that Mauricio is having success,” Kapler said. “I think it’s great. Last night, he obviously had some big hits for the Astros and he’s playing good defense and is off to a really good start. I want to get him out for the next couple of days and hope that (then) he continues to have success going forward.”
Asked if he was aware of Dubón’s frustrations over playing time with the Giants, Kapler said, “In my experience over the years, when players are not getting all of the opportunities that they want and they’re not performing, generally speaking, they’re not overjoyed with their situation.”
Kapler’s evaluation of the chances the Giants gave Dubón over his parts of four seasons with the team: “I feel like we gave Mauricio a lot of good opportunities, yes. … I’m pretty confident that we had a lot of supportive and encouraging conversations with Mauricio. Sometimes they were raising-the-bar conversations, sometimes they were just strictly supportive conversations. We always said to Mauricio — and what I would probably continue to say to any player today — is: ‘If you perform really well, you’re going to get lots of opportunities.’ ”
The Giants had to make a decision last season between Dubón and another right-handed-hitting infielder-outfielder, Thairo Estrada, who has emerged as one of San Francisco’s best players. Dubón had been frustrating for the organization at times because of some baserunning blunders, but for a team that has spent much of the past year discussing its need to go younger and more athletic, Dubón certainly seemed to fit that bill better last year than Tommy La Stella, an oft-injured infielder whose one roster advantage was that he hits left-handed. The Giants released La Stella after the season.
Dubón’s playing time will go back down in Houston when Jose Altuve comes off the injured list, but Dubón has said repeatedly that he’s just happy to sub while Altuve, whom he calls a mentor, is recovering from an injury suffered during the World Baseball Classic.
Monday’s game-winning hit in the seventh inning came off Dubón’s former minor-league teammate, Sean Hjelle. Dubón hadn’t faced the 6-foot-11 right-hander and called Hjelle “very intimidating.” Dubón added, “I’ve played behind him on defense when he was pitching, but I kind of had an idea what he was going to do, so I think that helped out a little bit.”
Source: San Francisco Chronicle
