Advertisement

Dodgers Manager Don Mattingly favors assault rifle ban

Share

TUCSON – As the Dodgers prepared to play a charity game Thursday in remembrance of a young shooting victim, Manager Don Mattingly said he favored a ban on assault rifles.

Mattingly was initially reluctant to talk about gun control.

“Politics now?” Mattingly asked. “I don’t know if I really want to get into it. I’m just not a gun guy. I never hunted as a kid. So I’m not much for the topic. I know we have coaches who love them; they think it’d be crazy if they weren’t allowed to have them.”

But Mattingly soon found himself talking about assault weapons.

“I don’t see any need for assault rifles,” he said. “It doesn’t make any sense for me for a guy to have an assault rifle in his house. If you ask me my personal opinion, I would definitely be against assault rifles, any kind of weapons that you’re able to fire off that many rounds at one time. It doesn’t make any sense. In the military, maybe.”

Advertisement

The game against the Chicago Cubs was to raise money for the Christina-Taylor Green Memorial Foundation. The 9-year-old daughter of Dodgers scout John Green was killed in the 2011 shooting that wounded then-Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. The shooter used a 9-mm Glock 19 semi-automatic pistol with a 33-round magazine, according to reports.

John Green said it was difficult for him to listen to gun control debates.

“I try to stay out of that, especially for today, because it’s such a political issue,” he said. “I don’t want to talk about the Christina-Taylor Green Memorial Foundation and that at the same time.”

ALSO:

Hanley Ramirez’s injury creating uncertainty in Dodgers infield

Looking at the ramifications of Dodgers losing Hanley Ramirez

Could Yasiel Puig replace Hanley Ramirez as Dodgers’ No. 5 hitter?

Advertisement

Advertisement