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Yankees' response to Betances was 'unprofessional,' says union chief

Anthony Gruppuso / USA TODAY Sports

Tony Clark isn't at all pleased with how the New York Yankees treated one of their own.

The executive director of the Major League Baseball Players Association spoke candidly to reporters Sunday, coming down hard on the club's "unprecented" response to reliever Dellin Betances salary requests in arbitration.

"There was a lot said," Clark said Sunday, according to The Associated Press. ''That was the most troubling thing. The arbitration has been around a long time. The folks that have been involved in the process, particularly with this particular case, have been around a long time.

"As you read and heard yesterday, that conversation and the particulars in some level related to that case being made public in the fashion that they were, is unprecedented and is unprofessional and should not have happened in the fashion that it did."

Related: Betances doesn't regret anything he said about Yankees president

Though he refused to name names, Clark's comments are likely geared specifically towards Yankees president Randy Levine as opposed to the club as a whole. Levine ripped the reliever's camp's $5-million salary demand as a "half-baked" attempt at manipulating the market while also blaming him for declining ticket sales.

Clark isn't the only member of the union who had words for Levine after the incident, however.

Rick Shapiro, a senior union executive who argued part of Betances' case during arbitration, later referred to Levine's comments as an "absolute disgrace" to all of MLB.

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