We’ve seen quite a few people who aren’t professional journalists be the first to report transactions over the years thanks to their connections, from liquor store employee Katie Camlin predicting Patrick Mahomes’ extension after a Kansas City Chiefs employee bought six bottles of Dom Perignon to celebrate it to Twitter user FredTheDog04’s news of Zdeno Chara’s broken jaw last year to r/whitesox Reddit users KatyPerrysBootyHole and wetbutt23 breaking the news of the Jose Quintana trade in 2017. Now, it looks like Atlanta Braves fan Brian Chandler broke the news that that team was about to sign Yasiel Puig after seeing Puig outside an Atlanta hotel:
Not to alarm anyone but I’m 99% positive Yasiel Puig walked out the Omni hotel in the battery, walked past me, and got in the back of an Uber. Big muscular man, same hair. Same face… Don’t wanna be that guy that breaks something wrong but… Puig to the #Braves?
— Brian Chandler (@_BrianChandler) July 14, 2020
100 minutes later, MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand tweeted that transaction.
Yasiel Puig is signing with the Braves, per source.
— Mark Feinsand (@Feinsand) July 14, 2020
Others, including Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic and Fox Sports, offered some credit to Chandler:
Puig deal with #Braves will not be finalized until physical is complete, source says. First: @Feinsand. And yes, @BrianC_Chandler was on it.
— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) July 14, 2020
Remarkably, this is at least the second time something like this has happened with the Braves. Back in 2014, @darrenstains (he’s since deleted his Twitter account) broke the news of the team signing A.J. Pierzynski, citing his father’s encounter with Braves’ then-manager Fredi Gonzalez at a Honey Baked Ham retail location. So it’s maybe worth keeping your eyes open for famous sports figures unexpectedly in town…it might give you a chance to be an insider for a day.
[Brian Chandler on Twitter]
