Former MLB star Jonathan Lucroy recalls refusing to kneel for anthem: ‘I gave them the finger’
Former MLB star catcher Jonathan Lucroy has opened up about dealing with Major League Baseball’s kneeling controversy during the shortened 2020 season.
Players knelt during the “Star-Spangled Banner” during a summer of tension caused by the killing of George Floyd. Lucroy said he was asked to kneel but refused the request. He didn’t say which team he was on, but he spent the 2020 season with the Boston Red Sox and Philadelphia Phillies.
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Jonathan Lucroy, #12 of the Boston Red Sox, warms up before an intrasquad game during summer practice at Fenway Park on July 12, 2020 in Boston. (Maddie Meyer/Getty Images)
“I wrote about it on Twitter the other day but when I was working like a lot of things happened and I don’t want to specify and name groups or anything like that, it’s not something I do,” Charly Arnolt told Tuesday on OutKick the Morning.
“But you know, you know that these groups are coming down, they don’t want you to focus on politics, they don’t want you to divide politics. They don’t want you to lean in a certain way, I want you to be neutral and just shut up, but the problem is I had a group that asked me to kneel down and sing a song and give them the finger and say no, I won’t do that. You can’t make me do that , nothing you are – I don’t do that.
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Former Milwaukee Brewers catcher Jonathan Lucroy waves to fans after officially retiring as a Brewer before the game against the Cincinnati Reds at American Family Field. (Benny Sieu-USA TODAY Sports)
“We were told by the team to get a goal. And if we don’t get a goal, we couldn’t see our family for three months. Now that goes down to the CDC, to MLB, then it’s passed on to the teams so it wasn’t the teams fault, but the kneeling in the middle of the stadium was a big deal to me that happened a few years ago and that turned me on to the culture war we’re fighting.”
Lucroy opened up about the song’s kneeling in a blog post on X earlier this month.
Lucroy played 12 seasons with nine different teams, most of which he spent with the Milwaukee Brewers. The Brewers drafted Lucroy out of Louisiana-Lafayette in the third round in 2007.
Milwaukee Brewers catcher Jonathan Lucroy, #20, waits his turn in the batting cage before playing the Pittsburgh Pirates at PNC Park in Pittsburgh on April 18, 2015. (Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports)
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He hit .274 with 108 home runs. He was an All-Star in 2014 and 2016.
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