Ryan Braun, whose father is from Israel, not only lost the chance to play out the reason of the season with the Milwaukee Brewers after he accepted his 65-day suspension for drug use, he also lost his image of the “good guy” who had convinced many that he was innocent of using performance drugs.
“As I have acknowledged in the past, I am not perfect. I realize now that I have made some mistakes. I am willing to accept the consequences of those actions,” said Braun in a statement issued via MLB.com.
He previously had stated, “The simple truth is that I’m innocent. The truth is always relevant and the truth prevailed.”
Braun will lose about $3 million by not playing, and many baseball fans are demanding that MLB rescind his Most Valuable Player award.
Braun’s Jewish roots go back to the Holocaust, when most of his father’s family was exterminated by the Nazis. He moved to the United States at the age of seven with his father, who later married a Catholic.
Although he is not Jewish by orthodox Jewish tradition, he considers himself Jewish and has been called the ”Hebrew Hammer,” a slogan that many angry fans now want to be banned because of his use of drugs to improve his baseball performance.