Someone is making fake Christian Yelich videos of some kind. For some reason.

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I am 100% sad for Christian Yelich if what he says here is true because someone doing bad stuff to someone else or portraying them falsely or anything like that is bad.

At the same time, it’s probably also something that we could file under “a thing we probably would’ve had no idea about if you hadn’t tweeted about it.” But I guess “get out in front of the controversy” is still rule number 1 of P.R. crisis aversion strategy, so he was probably damned no matter what he did.

In other news, who is making defamatory videos — no matter the genre — of Christian Yelich? What has he ever done to upset anyone? Besides, I dunno, being maybe the most underrated player in the game? Maybe other contenders for the most underrated crown — jealous underrated types! — are behind this. I mean, I’m not saying that Nolan Arenado or Jose Quintana are orchestrating a smear campaign, but perhaps their sympathizers are? You can’t control rabid fans.

Oh well, here’s hoping this gets nipped in the bud and that Yelich’s lawyers get medieval on whoever is messin’ with him.

Oakland Athletics reverse course: will continue to pay minor leaguers

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Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle reports that Oakland Athletics owner John Fisher has reversed course and will continue to pay minor leaguers. Fisher tells Slusser, “I concluded I made a mistake.” He said he is also setting up an assistance fund for furloughed employees.

The A’s decided in late May to stop paying paying minor leaguers as of June 1, which was the earliest date on which any club could do so after an MLB-wide agreement to pay minor leaguers through May 31 expired. In the event, the A’s were the only team to stop paying the $400/week stipends to players before the end of June. Some teams, notable the Royals and Twins, promised to keep the payments up through August 31, which is when the minor league season would’ve ended. The Washington Nationals decided to lop off $100 of the stipends last week but, after a day’s worth of blowback from the media and fans, reversed course themselves.