11/05/2026 05:18:00
Printable Page
11/05 17:16 CST Ex-Cleveland Guardians catcher Bo Naylor testifies he didn't
know gamblers bet on individual pitches
Ex-Cleveland Guardians catcher Bo Naylor testifies he didn't know gamblers bet
on individual pitches
By LARRY NEUMEISTER
Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) --- Catcher Bo Naylor, a former teammate of Cleveland Guardians
pitchers Emmanuel Clase and Luis Ortiz, testified Thursday at their New York
sports betting trial that he didn't know gamblers could place bets on
individual pitches until the criminal case arose.
Naylor, called as a defense witness out of turn because he is heading to his
wedding, made the revelation under cross-examination by Assistant U.S. Attorney
James Simmons, who asked if he knew such bets occurred at the time of 2025
baseball game recordings shown to a Brooklyn jury.
"I didn't know that before," he said. "I didn't know that until the situation."
"You didn't know people bet tens of thousands of dollars on pitches?" the
prosecutor asked him, though Naylor was stopped from answering when an
objection by defense lawyers was sustained.
The testimony reflected how quickly sports-betting possibilities have blossomed
in recent years. Legal sports betting has spread to 39 states in a steady
expansion since the U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way for it in 2018.
Betting on whether a pitch will be a ball or strike is a form of prop betting,
a popular type of wager often focused on individual players --- like achieving
a certain number of strikeouts in baseball, or points and rebounds in
basketball or surpassing a particular passing yardage in football.
Naylor, who was traded by Cleveland to the Milwaukee Brewers in August just
weeks before his new team won the World Series, was shown dozens of clips of
pitches thrown by Clase and Ortiz in 2025 when he was questioned first by
defense lawyers for the pitchers.
The lawyers elicited from Naylor that catchers notify pitchers what pitches
they should throw and where they should aim them before each pitch.
Naylor said catchers and pitchers develop a strategy during pregame meetings of
how to best pitch to each opponent to get an out based on an analysis of the
weak spots in the hitting habits of each batter.
He also acknowledged that pitchers, even the best ones, cannot be sure that
each pitch will go where it is aimed.
Clase, a three-time All-Star and two-time American League Reliever of the Year,
had "pretty good command" of his pitches, Naylor said.
Clase, 28, and Ortiz, 27, pleaded not guilty to conspiracy charges after they
were filed a year ago. Prosecutors said the players accepted several thousand
dollars in payments so sports gamblers could place bets on individual pitches,
enabling the gamblers to pocket at least $460,000.
Prosecutors said Clase, who had completed the fourth season of a $20 million,
five-year contract, began providing information about his pitches to bettors in
2023 and recruited Ortiz into the scheme in 2025. Ortiz earned $782,600
starting for the Guardians during the 2025 season.
Both are free on bail and are on nondisciplinary leave from the club without
pay while facing prosecution.
Naylor, who studied Spanish so he could communicate better with
Spanish-speaking teammates, acknowledged when he was being questioned by the
prosecutor that he was not close friends with Clase or Ortiz.
Simmons also elicited from Naylor that he had frequently seen Clase on his
cellular phone in the locker room.
Prosecutors have alleged that Clase sometimes broke Major League Baseball rules
by communicating with gamblers during games.
Naylor also acknowledged that pitchers ultimately have the final say as to what
pitch gets thrown because pitchers can wave off the catcher's call in favor of
a different pitch.
At one point during his testimony, Naylor was asked by Clase's defense
attorney, Michael Ferrara, if he had heard that Clase was into cockfighting
with people he knew from the Dominican Republic, where he grew up.
Naylor said he had based on "rumors I heard around the clubhouse."
Clase's lawyers have told the jury that the pitcher had friends who shared his
enthusiasm for cockfights, which are legal in the Dominican Republic, and for
playing dominoes, rather than sports gambling.
|
