Myers was allowed to pitch in front of the sellout crowd and a national television audience just 36 hours after he was arrested for allegedly twice hitting his wife in the head with his fist as the two argued on a sidewalk near their Boston hotel. He is free on $200 bail, and after his performance yesterday, the most he could say about the sorry episode was, ``I'm sorry it had to get public. Of course, it's embarrassing . . . But my teammates have been great. They've been behind me 100 percent. That's all I've got."
What a league. What a country. Myers is Philadelphia's best pitcher. The Phils are trying to snap out of a losing spell and . . . well, you know, he's innocent until proven guilty and he has a right to make a living.
And so he was out there throwing cut fastballs and changeups on a misty, humid afternoon. Nice message for all the young folks watching at home and in the stands.
It's just plain wrong. It's an embarrassment to baseball and an embarrassment to the Phillies. At the very least, Myers would have been better off if he'd been sent home to start counseling with his wife. Or maybe someone in authority could have condemned domestic violence -- in the generic sense. Instead all we got was ``the game must go on" -- 36 hours after a man was arrested for beating his wife.
According to the Phillies press guide, Myers was an amateur boxer until he was 13 years old. Now, if we can believe the Boston police and a couple of eyewitnesses, he just hits women half his size.
The Phillies came to Boston Thursday night around 8:30 and set up shop in the Sheraton. After midnight, Myers was seen hitting his wife and dragging her by the hair near the hotel. Multiple 911 calls were made by witnesses.
In a telephone interview with the Globe's Suzanne Smalley, 26-year-old Courtney Knight said, ``He was dragging her by the hair and slapping her across the face. She was yelling, `I'm not going to let you do this to me anymore' . . . She's a real small girl. It was awful."
The 25-year-old Myers is 6 feet 4 inches and weighs 240 pounds. His wife is 5-4 and weighs 120.
