ESPN baseball analyst Jessica Mendoza appeared on Golic and Wingo to discuss the Astros sign stealing scandal, and during that interview she made clear she had an issue with Mike Fiers going public with the information.

“To go public with it and call them out and start all of this, it’s hard to swallow.”

–@jessmendoza on former Astros pitcher Mike Fiers revealing the Astros sign-stealing scheme. pic.twitter.com/LSQY6B0dSC

— Keyshawn, JWill & Max (@KeyJayandMax) January 16, 2020

The part of her interview which is getting the most attention is her saying, “To go public with it and call them out and start all of this, it’s hard to swallow.”

While it should be clear Mendoza was not advocating or defending the Astros sign stealing, what she was doing was explicitly saying you do not go public with information about cheating.

Keep in mind, this was the first public statements by a Mets official since punishment was handed down by the commissioner’s office. While ESPN, the Mets, and Mendoza may want to couch this as her appearing on ESPN in her capacity as an ESPN employee only, it’s not that simple.

Mendoza is a Mets employee, and she is discussing what is a very hot button topic with the Mets right now vis-a-vis what the Mets should do with Carlos Beltran. On that note, it’s quite telling she wasn’t asked a question about Beltran’s job status.

The failure to address that issue puts ESPN’s journalistic integrity into question, and if the question was off limits, it speaks all the more to Mendoza wearing two hats in the same interview.

Overall, we are left with ESPN not asking a Mets employee about the biggest issue facing this franchise today, and we have a Mets employee, the only one who has spoken publicly on this topic, attacking a whistleblower.

This was just a bad look for everyone involved.