Trevor Bauer's Feud With Jon Heyman Is Painfully Stupid

Late Tuesday night, MLB Network's Jon Heyman took to Twitter and posted an innocuous report about free agent right-hander Trevor Bauer's contract demands. It wasn't anything Earth-shattering as pretty much everyone had a solid idea of what Bauer was asking for. For some reason, that tweet set Bauer off and he went hard after Heyman, starting a back-and-forth that was both mildly entertaining and stupid all at the same time.

Here's what Heyman posted:

Interested teams suggest Trevor Bauer seeks a 5- or 6-year deal for $36M to $40M (about $200M). Bauer is coming off a brilliant Cy Young season but the star market is slow. The record AAV is $36M by Bauer’s UCLA teammate Gerrit Cole. Agent Rachel Luba declines comment on talks.
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) December 30, 2020

There is nothing crazy about that tweet. Heyman is just relaying that Bauer is asking for a lot of money coming off a phenomenal season. He added that Bauer's agent declined to comment.

Bauer was not happy:

Jon thank god for you. I’m learning so much about my free agency from your tweets! Keep em coming! Also @AgentRachelLuba is her twitter tag in case you want to tag her next time. https://t.co/lyn4UIL58j
— Trevor Bauer (@BauerOutage) December 30, 2020

The reigning NL Cy Young Award winner didn't let up:

Allllllsooooooo if you’re going to go out of your way to report that someone declines to comment you might want to make sure it’s ACTUALLY true (*it’s not*). Don’t you have to actually talk to someone for them to “decline”? Wouldn’t want to be fake news now would we Jonny boy? https://t.co/lyn4UIL58j
— Trevor Bauer (@BauerOutage) December 30, 2020

Heyman responded to Bauer:

Actually it’s quite possible to decline comment by text, which is what she did.
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) December 30, 2020

Then Bauer's agent, Rachel Luba, got involved after Heyman said she had texted him to decline comment:

I’ve been traveling all day and haven’t opened your texts re contract lengths and $ amounts. If you’re referring to prior conversations we’ve had, when I declined to comment, I feel it’s disingenuous to tweet this without giving me a chance to respond to your texts this evening.
— Rachel Luba (@AgentRachelLuba) December 30, 2020

Bauer continued piling on:

Oh. I see what you’re trying to do here. Sneaky https://t.co/cGzCNse7Rh
— Trevor Bauer (@BauerOutage) December 30, 2020

I love a good fight as much as the next guy, so I broke out the popcorn and followed along. In the end, though, this was all pretty dumb.

I realize that Bauer is a Twitter troll and he has a lot of fun ruffling feathers and going after people, but this whole thing felt moronic. The initial tweet was a run-of-the-mill offseason report. None of it was surprising or shocking. Anyone in baseball can tell you Bauer is looking for more than $30 million for 2021 and if he signs a long-term deal he's looking for top starter money. That would put the average annual value north of $35-$36 million after Gerrit Cole's deal with the Yankees last winter. Again, none of the information in that tweet is controversial or crazy.

Heyman claimed Luba had declined to comment but she says she hadn't before that tweet. It's possible he previously asked her about contracts/amounts/etc. and she declined to comment and he carried that over. Either way, Bauer getting mad over this is silly and a huge waste of time.

I tend to find Bauer's antics funny sometimes, but attacking a reporter for, you know, reporting things, is as dumb as it gets. Who cares? Shrug it off and let it go. Getting worked up over it seems pointless.

If Bauer was upset about Heyman's tweet, how would he handle the media in New York if he signed with the Mets?