Zack Greinke was a former teammate of Ryan Braun during his time in Milwaukee. Now a pitcher on the Los Angeles Dodgers there was no shortage of slams directed at the Brewers outfielder who has been suspended for the remainder of the 2013 season.
Greinke called Braun a liar and a user in an interview with the Los Angeles Times:
“The main thing is, yeah, he lied to us,” Greinke said. “He forced us to lie for him, threw people under the bus in order to help himself out and didn’t care, blamed others for his mistakes, and it’s just a lot of things you don’t expect from people.
Greinke said he believed Braun when Braun said he never used performance-enhancing drugs.
“Oh, yeah, 100% believed him,” Greinke said. “Everything was so convincing. He had people to blame. He seemed like a really good guy. He was a good teammate at the time. You don’t know the guys that he was pinning it on. I’m not positive, but I think everyone 100% believed him at the time. Especially the next year, he looked just as good as the year before. His numbers his whole career, Hall of Fame numbers. How could you not believe him? He was so convincing.”
Asked whether his opinion on Braun as a player changed, Greinke replied, “Not even talking about the player. It’s just the person. Just the fact that he was willing to use anyone that got in his path. The closer you were to him, the more he would use you. It’s just disappointing that a human being could be like that. … The fact that even to this day he hasn’t had a real apology is really upsetting to me. I thought about it a bunch. He still hasn’t really apologized.”
Greinke is the latest athlete to express disappointment in Braun. Signed to a massive deal that runs though 2020 the Brewers and Braun have a lot of work to do in order to repair their image.
