Jean Segura leaves Brewers after family tragedy

It’s a sad day when someone passes away and I know that this news will effect the entire baseball world especially the members of the Milwaukee Brewers organization and their fans. Brewers manager Ron Roenicke announced Saturday that Brewers’ shortstop Jean Segura has temporarily left the team to return to his native Dominican Republic following the death of his nine-month old son.

According to MLB.com’s Aaron McCalvy, reporters knew of the tragedy last night but not the details or which player had been affected.

Roenicke made a brief statement to the press,

"“There’s been a death in one of the families of one of our players so I don’t want to answer questions. For respect of him right now, we’re not going to let anybody in the clubhouse. Sorry, but these things are tough and I just don’t want to leave any players open to anything. I don’t want to say who it is or anything, but we’ll get this figured out tomorrow and we can talk then.”"

A few more answers came this morning before game two of the Brewers’ game against the St. Louis Cardinals. Roenicke announced that Segura’s nine-month old son, Janniel, had passed away. The circumstances of the boys death were still unknown. Serving as the clubs’ representative center fielder Carlos Gomez made a statement as well.

Cardinals’ manager Mike Matheny echoed Gomez’s statement saying,

"“I heard just a little about it. I can’t even fathom that,” said Matheny. “We hurt for him, for sure.”"

Segura was added to the Bereavement List and Elian Hererra was re-called to replace him on the roster. The time period of Segura’s return to the Brewer’s is unknown at this time, however, under MLB Official Rules a player can be placed on the Bereavement List for a minimum of three games and a maximum of seven games but no one is worried about that now.

It appears that Segura’s son had been ill but the thought at least by Segura, who had called to check on his son prior to Friday’s game, was that the boy’s condition was improving. Roenicke said he gave ‘Seggy’ a hug after the phone call but that they had no idea that the situation was dire.

The Brewers have been in a slump losing ten of their last eleven games but this tragedy gave them some perspective.

"“This is a game we’re playing,” Roenicke said. “It’s certainly not as important as life, but we know it’s important to a lot of people in the community. These guys get that. They’ll be OK.”"