SCHENECTADY, N.Y. — Each every so often, Derek Bender will ship a textual content to considered one of his former teammates. Or he’ll name, and depart a voicemail.
However, after what occurred on Sept. 6, he has not acquired one textual content again. Not one name. He’s been left on learn, a ghosted pariah to a staff that has nothing left to do with him.
Greater than 5 months have handed for the reason that day the previous Minnesota Twins minor league catcher was accused of giving freely pitches to opposing batters on the Lakeland Flying Tigers, making an attempt to make sure his staff would miss the playoffs so a protracted, tiring season would finish, based on the allegations towards him. Every week later, he was launched, barely a month after receiving a $297,500 signing bonus as a sixth-round draft choice.
Since then, Bender has existed in a sort of baseball limbo: technically nonetheless knowledgeable baseball participant, however shunned by the remainder of that fraternity. He’s reached out to gamers in his draft class, guys he lived with on the spring coaching advanced, buddies and teammates.
Silence.
“There are lots of occasions the place you’re speaking with folks that you simply thought you had been buddies with, they simply don’t have a look at you an identical,” Bender stated. “I’ve heard my buddies get questioned about me, why they’re nonetheless buddies with me. That’s exhausting to listen to.
“It’s not like I’m getting accused of committing against the law.”
Bender is true. He faces no authorized penalties. He broke no legal guidelines.
However he’s accused of betraying the folks he labored with. He’s accused of undermining each single considered one of them, all to intentionally lose a sport, keep out of the playoffs and guarantee a aggressive season would come to an early finish. The sport’s historical past is crammed with gamers who’re accused of dishonest for their very own profit. This stands out even amongst these.
Bender is making an attempt to remain in baseball, and he’s making an attempt to regain some stage of management over his life. However he’s additionally coming to phrases along with his scenario: That for the remainder of his life, in knowledgeable or private atmosphere, these round him might have a nagging thought at the back of their minds.
Can he be trusted?
When the story of the Twins minor league catcher accused of promoting out his personal staff went viral on ESPN in September, Bender declined to remark. He hasn’t spoken in any respect in regards to the matter till agreeing to a February interview with The Athletic in his rented home close to Albany, N.Y.
Main League Baseball has been investigating Bender for months for a violation of Rule 21(a), which prohibits gamers from deliberately shedding video games, or making an attempt to lose video games. And since it stays ongoing, the Twins, Tigers, MLB and gamers’ union all declined to remark for this story.
League sources briefed on the investigation say the inquiry has uncovered proof towards Bender. Greater than a dozen folks have spoken to investigators, together with a number of with direct information of the alleged conduct. Notably, there was no video broadcast of the sport, regardless of the opposite 5 video games in that sequence being aired. If the league finds he violated the principles, he’d be taking a look at a everlasting ban, with the chance to use for reinstatement after a yr.
For the primary 25 minutes of a 90-minute interview, the dialog circled round the one actually related query. He talked of his practices with the Siena School baseball staff. Spoke of the hours main as much as his last sport with the Twins.
Lastly it got here time to ask the query that Bender had but to proactively reply himself.
“You had been accused of giving freely pitches as they had been coming as much as bat. Did that occur?”
“No,” Bender stated, with an nearly indignant chuckle. “And I’ll reside with this till the day I die. I by no means gave pitches away. I by no means tried to provide the opposing staff a bonus towards my very own staff.”
On the morning of Sept. 6, Bender needed the Fort Myers Mighty Mussels’ season to be over. He’d stated as a lot to teammates, joking previous to their doubleheader towards Lakeland that it wouldn’t be a foul factor in the event that they let a grounder slip underneath their gloves.
A pair losses would eradicate them from playoff rivalry, and that’s precisely what Bender was relying on. However he says he wasn’t critical, and he wasn’t speaking about truly throwing a sport. His need to depart was rooted in a necessity for a reset that he felt would assist enhance his sport.
“A number of us are coming off of faculty seasons, coming off of a fairly grueling summer time schedule,” Bender stated. “Then you definitely get there and also you’re hitting .200, you’re going through a number of the finest stuff persistently you’ve ever seen. You’re sinking or swimming, and also you’re fairly near sinking.
“The conversations are that everyone’s able to go house.”
It was immaturity like this, he stated, that got here to outline his last week in Fort Myers. He’d verbally sparred with participant improvement coaches, arguing with them on his offensive strategy.
Throughout a rain delay two days prior, he’d achieved a tarp slide on Lakeland’s area — an enormous no-no.
“That’s typically what you get with Derek. You get lots of emotion, lots of character,” stated longtime hitting coach and household good friend Dan Sausville. “He’s a daring dude. … I gave him numerous recommendation to maintain his mouth shut when he obtained to the minor leagues. I had given Derek some good recommendation, that he didn’t take.”
Sausville stated that Bender was “in a foul place” that week, and that he had texted with considered one of Bender’s brokers, discussing how Bender clearly wanted to get house.
Bender was known as into his supervisor’s workplace following that doubleheader towards Lakeland. Lakeland supervisor Andrew Graham had knowledgeable his Fort Myers counterpart that his gamers heard Bender giving freely pitches earlier than they had been thrown. Bender stated he instantly denied it. Makes an attempt to succeed in Graham and Fort Myers supervisor Brian Meyer for remark had been unsuccessful.
The Athletic additionally tried to contact quite a few gamers and coaches from each groups, in addition to the house plate umpire; none could possibly be reached for remark.
Bender stated there was nothing he stated that could possibly be interpreted as giving freely pitches, and he couldn’t consider any cause somebody would make it up.
Fort Myers had already misplaced six video games in a row. And starter Ross Dunn, who had a 6.46 ERA, was yanked within the second inning after permitting 5 of the primary seven batters that body to succeed in within the 6-0 loss. His 1 2/3 innings matched his shortest begin of the season.
Bender wasn’t allowed within the dugout the next two video games. He watched from the bullpen because the season wrapped up. At first, he stated, some teammates had his again. However help began to dwindle.
“I talked to him,” Bender stated of his try at a dialog with Dunn. “I instructed him, ‘No matter you’re listening to, it’s simply not true. I wouldn’t do this.’ And he stated, ‘I hope not, however it’s simply what I’m listening to. However I hope not.’
“It’s the final time I’ve heard from him.”
Dunn couldn’t be reached for remark.
When the season formally ended, Bender packed up. There have been no heartfelt goodbyes. “I needed to get the hell out.”
The Twins, Bender stated, had been keen to maintain him within the group. However they’d one requirement. He wanted to confess to every little thing and apologize for it.
He tried to come clean with it, he stated. He apologized. However when the membership requested what he was sorry for, he got here up empty. The Twins, staff sources stated, had already carried out an inside investigation led by GM Jeremy Zoll. Of their thoughts, this was not only a query of immaturity. This was a participant they might not make use of.
“The one factor I had left was my character at that time,” Bender stated. “Actually, the best way they put it was, ‘If you wish to die by the sword, we’ll launch you.’ I knew there was no bluffing concerned.”
It was cool to know Derek Bender, a hometown hero on a big-league path.
He performed only one yr of highschool ball at St. James Excessive in South Carolina, however stays in this system’s Corridor of Fame.
“He set the tone in our program for work, totally different from any participant we’ve had earlier than,” stated St. James head coach Robbie Centracchio.
Bender moved on to Coastal Carolina College, a baseball program that has produced main leaguers Tommy La Stella, Taylor Motter and Kirt Manwaring, amongst others, and received a nationwide championship in 2016. Bender broke out for CCU in 2023 with 19 house runs after which excelled within the Cape Cod League that summer time. There was discuss of him as a Day 1 choice within the MLB Draft. The Twins had been intrigued by the facility potential in his right-handed bat.
Bender starred at Coastal Carolina, resulting in his choice within the sixth spherical of the MLB draft. (John Byrum / Icon Sportswire by way of Getty Photos)
Now, he doesn’t depart the one-bedroom house he’s rented with out his hood up, fearing that even a pleasant chat may be had with somebody secretly assuming the worst. He stated he feels responsible as a result of photographs of him in his Coastal Carolina uniform had been being utilized in information articles.
He’s spent the entire offseason operating from this. Weeks of sleeping on couches of his buddies’ school residences in Toledo and Richmond to keep away from going house.
He didn’t wish to return to his dad and mom in South Carolina, a spot so carefully related to a sport he’d begun to consider he’d by no means play once more. Bender’s dad and mom have taken his scenario exhausting. His father, Dennis, checks MLB’s press releases day-after-day to see if there’s an announcement from the league about his standing, and has met with a lawyer about doable steps to sue. His mom, Diane, says she wakes up in the course of the evening and cries.
“It breaks my coronary heart for my child,” Diane stated, “that it’s a chance that he may not be capable to play this sport once more at a excessive stage. As a result of that’s all he ever needed to do.”
As a substitute of shifting again in along with his household, he crashed with a childhood good friend in Albany, the place he’d grown up.
“I needed to be round my buddies,” Bender stated. “… I needed to be someplace the place baseball didn’t matter as a lot.”
Bender’s rental home isn’t messy, however isn’t clear both. There’s an uneaten and unheated burrito on his plate, and a jumbo Chick-fil-A cup rests on a small desk in entrance of the chair the place he sits. He’s carrying Timberland boots, black cargo pants and a T-shirt.
That he was talking publicly in any respect was so controversial inside his personal circles that he stated he was unable to sleep the evening prior.
For months, Bender’s company, Octagon, strongly suggested him towards doing an interview. It needed to attend till the league resolved its investigation into him.
Bender took that recommendation, till he didn’t. Torn between the intuition to provide his facet and the necessity for persistence, he ultimately determined he couldn’t wait any longer.
“It’s about gaining management over my life,” Bender stated. “And this complete scenario. I’m not doing this as a last-ditch effort to get again into affiliate ball. It’s extra of that is the beginning of me taking management of my life once more. As a result of I’ve let this utterly management me for months now.”
His major agent, Jake Rosner, stated he was unaware the interview had taken place. And after The Athletic reached out to Rosner to request remark, Octagon dropped Bender as a consumer.
“We’d have most well-liked that he not do any media requests or sit down with anybody from the media till this investigation was closed,” stated Rosner, including that it indicated to them he was not taking Octagon’s recommendation.
“We don’t make feedback when investigations are ongoing,” Rosner stated. “That easy.”
Although he’s denying the allegations now, Bender stated he trusted Octagon’s recommendation on the time, which is why he declined to remark when the story first broke.
What got here after Bender’s no-comment to ESPN was one thing Bender by no means anticipated. He says he was unaware of the reporter Jeff Passan, a outstanding and well-sourced baseball author. Because of this, Bender didn’t perceive the attain his story would garner.
That’s till about 10 p.m. that night, when he was hanging out with buddies. There, he skilled the surreal feeling of getting a push notification about himself.
Nearly instantly, aggregated articles began pouring in from information shops everywhere in the nation. Messages on all of his social media accounts. Bender and his buddies sat and watched it unfold in actual time.
“I needed to go darkish for no less than three days,” Bender stated. “I needed to non-public all my social media accounts. I used to be getting dying threats and terrible, obscene issues stated to me.”
The vitriol has simmered, as anticipated. The world has moved on from this story in a manner that Bender nonetheless can’t.
And now with no agent and a shredded popularity, Bender awaits MLB’s verdict. He sat down with investigators in November, going over that inning pitch-by-pitch. Attempting to persuade them that he’s harmless, with the potential for a career-ending ban in the event that they resolve in any other case.
“I really feel like my complete life has been centered round baseball, and for good cause, “ Bender stated.
“This complete scenario made me fall out of affection with it. However I spotted that I wish to win extra baseball video games in my profession. I really like baseball. I really like profitable. I really like being part of a staff. There’s nothing extra I wish to do.”
At the back of Bender’s automobile is a big Twins duffel bag that also carries all of his baseball gear.
His relationship with the staff that gave him an opportunity is difficult. In a single breath, he’s complimentary: “I don’t fault anyone within the Twins group. I feel they dealt with it nicely.”
However in one other, he says the precise reverse. “It by no means actually felt just like the Twins had my again.”
It stays a really actual chance that Bender’s Twins bag would be the final huge league gear he’ll ever obtain. He’s achieved the plain calculation in his thoughts. This by no means would have occurred to a first-round choose, he stated. However a sixth-round choose? There’s no impetus for one more staff to take him on.
The game of baseball may very simply proceed on with out Derek Bender.
“That’s the truth of it,” he stated, totally accepting of that reality.
This accusation may comply with him all through his life, a detriment to any profession path. The longtime hockey fan desires to sometime be a psychologist for NHL gamers. However at simply 22, Bender views his subsequent job as an opportunity at redemption. He’ll earn simply $1,200 this summer time taking part in unbiased ball for the Brockton Rox of the Frontier League. It’s a transfer that’s extra about proving to himself and everybody else simply how a lot he cares about profitable.
Even with a GM and coach who’ve identified Bender for years, Brockton is taking part in this cautiously. And nothing is assured till he truly takes the sphere. The outcomes of MLB’s investigation may influence his skill to play, or Brockton’s need to have him.
“I feel the largest factor was being keen to provide a man a second probability, to do what he’s educated his complete life to do, and what he loves,” stated Rox GM Jerod Edmondson, who stated he didn’t examine the allegations earlier than including Bender. “I feel all people makes errors. He’s 22 years outdated.”
Sausville is Brockton’s hitting coach. There have been stretches through which the 2 talked 20 occasions a day. And as a longtime confidant of Bender, he believes in Bender’s innocence. Even when MLB ultimately says he’s responsible, Sausville will welcome him.
However he’s not blind to the circumstances that led Bender right here, and stays open to the concept that there could possibly be extra to this accusation than he is aware of.
“After that is all stated and achieved, he wants to sit down within the mirror and ask himself: why isn’t everybody leaping as much as stick up for me?” Sausville stated.
“I feel lots of it comes from egocentric immaturity. And in addition a one-track thoughts of, ‘I’m making an attempt to make the large leagues … and I don’t care who I piss off on the best way there.”
Bender desires to show he can nonetheless be a catcher, regardless that he is aware of his solely path may be a transfer to first base, recognizing that pitchers will probably be apprehensive to throw to him.
He desires to inform the world that he’s an individual who loves these near him. “I’m a loving good friend, I’m a caring particular person. I’m a man that (teammates) need of their foxhole.”
He desires folks to just accept that he’s a modified athlete, who’s achieved complaining about having to play. “You’ll by no means hear that come out of my mouth once more,” he stated. “I’ve labored actually exhausting for this, and I don’t need all of it to go away due to one accusation.”
However, he stated, he doesn’t really feel like he owes it to anybody to plead his innocence.
Bender may not really feel an obligation to show his credibility. But it surely nonetheless is one thing that, with each phrase he says, will probably be repeatedly scrutinized. It’s not going away.
So, finally the query stays.
Can he be trusted?
“Individuals will suppose no matter they wish to suppose, whether or not I say it or not,” he stated.
“Like let’s be sincere. No person’s ever going to be right here and say ‘Yeah, I did it.’ More often than not, individuals are going to disclaim, deny, deny. Individuals are going to make their selections, whether or not I say it or not.”
The Athletic’s Dan Hayes contributed reporting to this story.
(Prime Illustration: Demetrius Robinson / The Athletic; Photograph: Isaiah Vazquez/Getty Photos)