Kelly Gruber Doesn’t Get It

Blue Jays fans used to have a lasting image of Kelly Gruber. It was the photo of him clipping the heel of Deion Sanders during the 1992 World Series. That’s what people used to remember most about the former Blue Jays third baseman.

Then on Thursday during a Pitch Talks panel appearance, Gruber completely changed the perception of him, not just as a player, but as a person. It’s no longer as the scrappy third baseman who used to play for the Jays; it’s as the rude, crass and arrogant retired baseball player.

By now, you’ve probably heard or seen Gruber’s inexcusable treatment of Pitch Talks host Ashley Docking on Thursday night. Gruber was combative, he didn’t seem of sound mind and straight-up embarrassed himself on stage for his behaviour. There is no excuse for what he did or how he treated Docking.


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In hindsight, this kind of behaviour from Gruber isn’t very surprising. A few days prior to that appearance at Pitch Talks, Gruber made some strange comments to The Athletic when the topic turned to female reporters in the locker room. The gist of it was he believes men have an equal right to be in a women’s locker room if women reporters are welcome in the men’s locker room.

When it came to female reporters, Gruber told The Athletic: “And I wanted to help them, to let them do their job.” On Thursday night, he did the exact opposite. He made it extremely difficult for Docking to do her job and the plug was abruptly pulled on the show.

After the fact, in the statement posted by Pitch Talks, it was revealed that Gruber made inappropriate comments towards a female staff member at The Rec Room as well. These aren’t “isolated incidents” anymore. These comments and actions reiterate the kind of person Gruber is.

We are here in the year 2018 and he’s acting like it’s 1968. The truth is, acting that way towards anybody was never okay in the first place, but it’s really not okay now.

It’s unfortunate because here’s someone in the public eye; someone who a generation of Blue Jays fans idolized and looked up to. Now that he revealed the kind of person that he is in real life, nobody romanticizes his career anymore.

It reminded me of a Blue Jays event I attended many years ago. Jesse Barfield was there, but so was Gruber. Barfield was world-class, extremely accommodating and genuinely engaged with the people he spoke to. I didn’t know much about him growing up, but as an adult, I hold Barfield in extremely high regard now.

If you ever get the opportunity to meet the former Blue Jays right fielder, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. He’s someone who exceeded my expectations for how nice he was in person. Barfield was better than I could’ve imagined.

On the other hand, we have Gruber. I vaguely recall speaking with him at the same event, but after I left the event, I remember thinking “he’s nothing like I expected him to be. In fact, I don’t think I like him at all.”

Barfield is someone who gets it. In 1987, during the midst of the Blue Jays’ playoff push, WFAN’s Suzyn Waldman was simply doing her job, reporting in the Blue Jays locker room when George Bell refused to speak to the media because she was in the clubhouse.


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Bell refused to budge, but Barfield stepped up and asked Waldman to interview him. It was a simple gesture, but an important one. Here’s what Barfield told the New York Times a few years after that fateful encounter with Waldman in the Blue Jays locker room:

“She was just trying to do her job, just like I’m trying to do mine. And I only did what I want done to me. As long as they respect us, they should be respected as well.”

It was a completely different climate in 1987, but Barfield got it. He understood equality. In the year 2018, 31 years later, Gruber still doesn’t get it.

Fans are guilty of putting players on a pedestal. They hold professional athletes to a higher standard, which is why it’s so shocking when athletes fail to live up to expectations or they do crappy things. Athletes seem bulletproof, but they often wrestle with the very same demons “regular people” do.

I’m glad that Pitch Talks barred Gruber from future events and the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame did the right thing by uninviting him from this weekend’s induction ceremony. After his behaviour, he shouldn’t be anywhere near the Blue Jays organization in any capacity.

Some might say what Gruber said and did was fairly tame compared to what others in the public eye have done. The reality is it doesn’t matter if those comments didn’t make you feel uncomfortable, it clearly made Docking uneasy. That’s all it takes.

Gruber took multiple jabs and played it off as if he was “ribbing” the host, but in reality, he straight-up belittled her on stage in front of hundreds of people. Docking didn’t back down and demonstrated courage for how she responded when confronted by Gruber.


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If I were in that situation, I probably would’ve just sat there frozen in fear, because who on earth actually says something like that in public in the year 2018?

We live in a different era now. Gruber may have gotten away with stuff like that in the late 80’s and early 90’s, but the level for tolerable behaviour and remarks is much different in the 21st century. There should be zero tolerance for comments like Gruber’s.

Ian Hunter

Ian has been writing about the Toronto Blue Jays since 2007. He enjoyed the tail-end of the Roy Halladay era and vividly remembers the Alex Rodriguez "mine" incident. He'll also retell the story of Game 5 of the 2015 ALDS to his kids for the next 20 years.

7 thoughts on “Kelly Gruber Doesn’t Get It

  • June 17, 2018 at 11:17 am
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    Crassness is but a part of a person’s personality, man. And it’s not always there in all of our interactions. All of us have bad days, where we don’t do a good enough job of pushing those harsher and meaner tendencies into the shadows. I appreciate your sentiments, but, this is exactly why fans shouldn’t expect an athlete, or politician or doctor or actor or anyone that we have been taught to look up to in this society, to be anything but good at their chosen field.

    There are all kinds of jerks in this world…and, I imagine, there will be many ballplayers in that category. It is, very much, a man’s domain. So we shouldn’t be surprised when ‘locker room talk’ (forgive me for using that Trumpism excuse) bleeds out, even if it comes out of the mouth of someone who has been retired for twenty years or so. Honestly, that’s the type of talk you hear on the construction site, among the guys who work in trades and other vocations where a woman’s presence isn’t common. It’s harsh, no doubt. But it’s always there, just under the surface.

    I’m not excusing the belittling behavior. But sometimes people make mistakes. Before giving up on the guy completely, let’s see if he tries to make amends.

    • June 17, 2018 at 9:02 pm
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      It would be one thing if this were an isolated incident or a slip of the tongue. But this is a pattern of established behaviour by him. He doesn’t get the benefit of the doubt that he “gets it” because every action of his over the past week indicates he doesn’t get it.

  • June 17, 2018 at 10:13 pm
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    Ashley Docking is such a strong woman I have zero doubts she could handle Gruber, but it’s so nice to know how supported she was at Pitch Talks and in this article.

    And Jesse Barfield is proof that it doesn’t have to be about the locker room bs, and that athletes can be wonderful heroes and role models. Class act since the 80s 🙂

  • June 18, 2018 at 7:36 am
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    So what if Kelly Gruber is a jerk? He was drunk, deal with it, he didn’t kill anybody. Lots of people are jerks…..Greg Zaun may be a jerk, but he was way more entertaining ( and is ) than Kevin Barker and Joe Siddall….I don’t see why women have to be included nowadays in EVERYTHING a man bloody does, if they want quid pro quo, let male reporters follow top female athletes into their dressing rooms as well….seems to me you’re a pussy whipped hypocrite, much like the golf “purists” who want to crucify Phil Mikkelson for “disrespecting the holy sacrament ” of golf…..what Phil did was funny, what Gruber did was obnoxious but what do you want from a drunk old ex baseball player anyway? Get a life of your own, eh?! Now there’s a few choice ( and deliberately planted ) sexist and anachronistic comments in my post for you to get all self – righteous now and pass judgement on me ( who you know NOTHING about )….come on, please, I can’t afford therapy and I was born in the fifties, so I don’t deserve any respect and I’m not drunk but hey, anyone not born before 1990 doesn’t have a right to voice their opinion unless they’re gay, transgender, lesbian, vegan, or some other fukked up as yet undefined modern milennial entity, lol!

    • June 27, 2018 at 12:58 pm
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      Well said. I do believe Kelly needs to be careful with what he says, especially in a public forum, if for nothing else his own career. But you are right, this over sensituve politically correct society needs to change.

  • August 13, 2018 at 10:42 am
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    Oh boo hoo. The world isn’t fair. Wah wah wah.

  • June 11, 2021 at 2:59 am
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    Let’s all remember this is an opinion piece. Anyone that knows Kelly, that grew up with Kelly, would quickly let you know he’s never been nothing other than a kind person. Very shy and humble growing up. He never even realized he was our schools golden boy. Nice to absolutely everyone, no exceptions. People can go through hard times we know nothing about. But, if Kelly was out of character there was a reason other than a possible drink to many. His real friends and family will forever be proud of him and better for knowing him.

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