Matt Harvey Suspended for Providing Drugs to Tyler Skaggs

Matt Harvey, a veteran pitcher on a minor-league contract with the Baltimore Orioles, was suspended for 60 video games by Major League Baseball on Tuesday for distributing a prohibited drug of abuse.

Harvey, who was as soon as the ace of a Mets beginning rotation that led the staff to the 2015 World Series, overtly mentioned his drug use through the trial of Eric Kay, a former Los Angeles Angels worker who was discovered responsible on two prices over his function within the demise of Tyler Skaggs, a pitcher on the staff. Skaggs, a teammate of Harvey’s on the Angels in 2019, was discovered useless at age 27 in a lodge room in Texas after overdosing on a mix of medicine, together with fentanyl.

During Kay’s trial, through which Harvey and a number of other former teammates have been candid about drug use amongst Angels gamers, Harvey, 33, mentioned cocaine was his drug of alternative however that he started utilizing Percocet, an opioid, through the 2019 season. He mentioned he shared among the Percocet with Skaggs. Federal prosecutors mentioned Skaggs was killed by fentanyl supplied to him by Kay, not the Percocet given to him by Harvey, who obtained immunity from prosecution in trade for his testimony.

Kay’s legal professionals, who contended the medicine supplied by Harvey might have been what killed Skaggs, requested Harvey if he had ever requested his teammate to watch out along with his drug use.

“Looking back, I wish I had,” Harvey mentioned. “In baseball, you do everything you can to stay on the field. At the time, I felt as a teammate I was just helping him get through whatever he needed to get through.”

In M.L.B.’s announcement of Harvey’s punishment, the league acknowledged Harvey had violated the phrases of the joint drug prevention and remedy program by distributing a drug of abuse and that the suspension was retroactive to April 29. Under the phrases of his contract with Baltimore, Harvey would obtain $1 million this season if he makes the staff’s 40-man roster. He has not pitched in any video games, main or minor league, this season.

In February, a jury in Fort Worth discovered Kay, a former communications director for the Angels, responsible of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute a managed substance and conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute a managed substance leading to demise and severe bodily harm. He faces between 20 years and life in jail and is anticipated to be sentenced on June 28.