The Washington Nationals may have drafted a bad character in the 15th round of the 2011 MLB Draft, at least if his Twitter was any indication. The team is looking into a series of tweets made on the now-deleted account of Zach Houchins, a shortstop from Louisburg College in North Carolina. Those tweets, which you can find here, include some racist and sexist slurs.
↵Via Ben Goessling of MASNSports.com:
↵↵↵↵↵The Nationals are investigating derogatory comments made by their 15th-round pick in this year's First-Year Player Draft on his Twitter account, general manager Mike Rizzo said through a team spokesman.
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Rizzo said the team is "investigating" the matter, and that's where it stands right now. It's not clear whether the Nationals knew about Houchins' Twitter account before picking him. If they didn't, well, that's not particularly good. But of course, social media can be misleading, and you never know exactly who is behind that keyboard.
↵UPDATE: Houchins responded in an interview with Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post, apologizing for the tweets, but making clear that he is not a racist and that he was just tweeting like his friends talk. He seemed very worried about his future, Kilgore reported.