Who knew the New York Yankees were so sensitive about Alex Rodriguez?
The Tampa Bay Rays’ minor-league affiliate, the single-A Charlotte Stone Crabs, planned a promotional event for last Friday that was called “juice box night,” which intended to poke fun at the Yankees slugger.
The Stone Crabs were planning to give out the juice boxes to the first 500 fans in attendance at Charlotte Sports Park, providing the opportunity to donate them to the Charlotte County Homeless Coalition.
Each individual box would have said:
“100% Juiced. Side Affects [sic] include: tainted records, inflated ego, omission from the Hall of Fame, and more!”
However, the Yankees stepped in and claimed that the event was in poor taste.
Yankees spokesperson Jason Zillo told local reporters that the team contacted Major League Baseball commissioner’s office and the Rays with the hope of stopping the promotion.
Hours later, the Stone Crabs announced that the promotion was cancelled, citing “public feedback” and that the event could be viewed as insensitive.
“We apologize for the insensitive nature of (Friday’s) promotion,” Stone Crabs general manager Jared Forma said in a statement. “We in no way meant any ill intent or to offend anyone with this promotion, and we sincerely apologize to the Yankees organization, the Tampa Bay Rays organization, and anyone offended by this promotion.”
The Crabs are owned by Ripken Baseball and operate independently of their parent club, but a member of the Rays organization told the Charlotte Sun that “the Rays were unaware of the promotion and found it in poor taste.”
According to Yahoo! Sports, the Stone Crabs have deleted all mentions of the event from their social media accounts.
