CRYING FOUL

Yankee Josh Donaldson Denies That Calling Black Player ‘Jackie’ Was Racial Gibe

“He just made a disrespectful comment. He was trying to call me Jackie Robinson,” Tim Anderson of the White Sox said.

Yankees third baseman Josh Donaldson is denying that when he repeatedly called White Sox shortstop Tim Anderson “Jackie” on Saturday it was meant as a racial gibe, the New York Post reports. Anderson, who is Black, called it a “disrespectful comment,” saying, “He was trying to call me Jackie Robinson, ‘What’s up Jackie?’” Anderson said he let the comment go once and then got upset when it was repeated. “I’ll never sleep this off,” he said. Donaldson, who is white, claims he was referencing a 2019 Sports Illustrated story in which Anderson called himself a modern Jackie Robinson. “I’ve said it to him in years past, not in any manner [other] than just joking around,” he insisted.