(670 The Score) Former Cubs executive and recently hired Mets general manager Jared Porter sent a series of explicit, unsolicited lewd texts to a female reporter in 2016, ESPN reported late Monday night. It quickly cost him his new job, with the Mets announcing his firing Tuesday morning.
The text messages culminated with Porter sending a photo of an erect, naked penis, ESPN reported. The female reporter was a foreign correspondent, and she ignored more than 60 text messages in a row from Porter at one point before the inappropriate lewd photo was sent, ESPN reported.
When the incidents started, Porter was working as the Cubs’ director of professional scouting. What was at first a casual exchange of messages turned into Porter “complimenting her appearance, inviting her to meet him in various cities and asking why she was ignoring him,” according to the report.
The woman “stopped responding to Porter after he sent a photo of pants featuring a bulge in the groin area,” ESPN reported, but he kept sending unsolicited messages after that.
The 41-year-old Porter admitted to texting the woman when contacted by ESPN. He claimed the explicit photos weren’t of himself, saying they were “kinda like joke-stock images,” ESPN reported.
The woman has since left the profession.
"My number one motivation is I want to prevent this from happening to someone else," the woman told ESPN. "Obviously he's in a much greater position of power. I want to prevent that from happening again. The other thing is I never really got the notion that he was truly sorry.”
Upset by the situation, the woman – with the help of a lawyer – got in touch with the Cubs during their playoff run in 2016. She met an employee from the Cubs who was from her home country, who “encouraged her use the situation to her advantage,” ESPN reported. The Cubs employee responded that he “was just listening to both” the woman and Porter.
“I didn’t want to be on one side,” the Cubs employee was quoted as saying by ESPN.
ESPN didn’t identify the Cubs employee. The Cubs did release a statement to ESPN.
"This story came to our attention tonight, and we are not aware of this incident ever being reported to the organization,” the Cubs said.
"Had we been notified, we would have taken swift action as the alleged behavior is in violation of our code of conduct. While these two individuals are no longer with the organization, we take issues of sexual harassment seriously and plan to investigate the matter."
After the Cubs won the championship in 2016, Porter left to join the Diamondbacks organization. The Cubs had hired Porter in 2015.