MLB Writer Brazenly Asked Yu Darvish to Quit Twitter and Darvish Had the Perfect Response
By Jerry Trotta
If you follow Yu Darvish outside of baseball, you will oft find him clapping back at cynics on social media.
The Chicago Tribune opted to run an article titled, "12 changes the Cubs should make for the 2020 season" this week, and No.11 mentioned Darvish's presence on Twitter, boldly requesting that he forgo his tendency to troll his doubters.
In a perfect bit of irony, Darvish managed to do the complete opposite by absolutely lambasting the Tribune's ridiculous recommendation with a perfect tweet.
the current president of the BBWAA asking a team to silence its player on twitter is totally out of bounds https://t.co/Sx6MXYbaGg
— keithlaw (@keithlaw) January 13, 2020
Darvish putting the news outlet in a body bag dates back to the flak he received for scorning NBC Sports' Dave Kaplan on Twitter, following a poor outing against the San Francisco Giants in August.
We just did the research here in the studio @NBCSChicago. This season when he has any 2 strike count on a hitter, @faridyu is throwing nearly 80% off speed pitches. 3 of the HR’s he allowed tonight were with 2 strikes and those 3 all were off speed pitches. #YuTooPredictable
— David Kaplan (@thekapman) August 22, 2019
As for Darvish's response:
Not including tonight’s game.
— ダルビッシュ有(Yu Darvish) (@faridyu) August 22, 2019
Against lefty after two strilke.
Off speed pitch .137AVG .205OBP .222SLG .427OPS
4 seam .350AVG .435OBP .650SLG .1085OPS
Which one is better choice? https://t.co/gJQRZiMbJD
Game. Set. Match.
Asking the Japan native to refrain from social media is ludicrous to begin with. That fact that the Tribune (and the current BBWAA president!) suggested that he cease replying to skeptics who don't conduct nearly enough research before criticizing his game is preposterous. Darvish had a red-hot second half, and did his darndest to make the game fun again. He is not the problem here.
Never change, Yu.