Seattle Mariners player suspended for calling BLM protestors ‘animals’

Seattle Mariners’ catcher Steve Clevenger has been suspended without pay for the rest of the season after tweeting that Black Lives Matter protestors in should be “locked behind bars like animals.” 

{mosads}“Black people beating whites when a thug got shot holding a gun by a black officer haha s*** cracks me up! Keep kneeling for the anthem!,” Clevenger wrote in one of a pair of tweets that have been deleted.

“BLM (Black Lives Matter) is pathetic again! Obama you are pathetic once again! Everyone should be locked behind bars like animals!”

#Mariners say they are “looking into” controversial tweets coming pitcher Steve Clevenger’s account screencapped by @cablebox666: pic.twitter.com/RcWNdqflGV

— Jon Humbert (@jonhumbert) September 22, 2016

Clevenger’s tweets follow protests in Charlotte over the fatal police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott.

The Mariners issued a statement on Friday, announcing the catcher’s suspension.

“As soon as we became aware of the tweets posted by Steve yesterday we began to examine all of our options in regard to his standing on the team,” the team’s general manager said in a statement, according to the Seattle Times. “Today we have informed him that he is suspended for the reminder of the season without pay.”

Clevenger apologized on Thursday night, according to a Facebook post of a Fox Sports reporter.  

“I am sickened by the idea that anyone would think of me in racist terms. My tweets were reactionary to the events I saw on the news and were worded beyond poorly at best and I can see how and why someone could read into my tweets far more deeply than how I actually feel,” he said in the statement.