In July, longtime Colorado Rockies all-star Troy Tulowitzki was traded to the Toronto Blue Jays in a transaction that involved the Jays' shortstop, Jose Reyes.
Afterward, Tulowitzki helped Toronto make the playoffs, while Reyes, who was among the best players at his position during his 2003-2011 run with the New York Mets, had a sub-par stint with the Rockies (his batting average was .259, as compared to .285 prior to leaving Canada) — and only weeks after his arrival in Colorado, he announced that he would welcome a move to another squad, saying, "I don't want to spend the rest of my career with a last-place team."
These factors hardly endeared Reyes to the Rockies faithful — but what allegedly happened in recent days is infinitely worse.
Reyes has been arrested and charged in the alleged Halloween assault of his wife, Katherine, on the Hawaiian island of Maui.
A behind-the-scenes video from Reyes's Toronto days depicts his family life in idyllic terms; we've included it below.
But the account about the Maui matter from a TV station known as Hawaii News Now contrasts sharply with this portrayal.
According to the outlet, Reyes and his wife were vacationing at the Four Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea.
On the afternoon of October 31, the pair are said to have gotten into an argument that became physical.
Katherine told officers that Reyes yanked her off the bed in their room and shoved her. Then, she went on, he took her by the throat and shoved her again, this time into a sliding glass door that opened onto a balcony.
After hotel security called police, Katherine was taken to a local hospital for treatment, with reported injuries to her neck, thigh and wrist.
In the meantime, Reyes was arrested on a charge of abusing a family or household member.
Somehow, the incident remained quiet until November 9 — and reports prompted the following statement by the Rockies, distributed via the team's Twitter account.
Colorado Rockies statement regarding Jose Reyes: pic.twitter.com/bCeMxRzune
— Colorado Rockies (@Rockies) November 10, 2015Possible punishment of Reyes through the criminal justice system could be accompanied by discipline from Major League Baseball, which recently revamped its domestic violence policy — an effort on the part of MLB to avoid the sort of negative publicity suffered by the National Football League after a video of Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice slugging his fiancee in an elevator was made public.
As noted by 9News, the policy gives Commissioner Rob Manfred wide latitude to “issue the discipline he believes is appropriate in light of the severity of the conduct. The Commissioner’s authority to discipline is not dependent on whether the player is convicted or pleads guilty to a crime.”
Thus far, no baseballer has been through this discipline matrix. Reyes would be the first.
That's not exactly the kind of record the Rockies were hoping he would set. Look below to see a larger version of Reyes's booking photo, a Hawaii News Now report and the aforementioned family video.
Hawaii News Now - KGMB and KHNL
