Photo by Peter G. Aiken-USA TODAY Sports
Paul Kinzer, the agent for Edwin Encarnacion, has called a bombshell lawsuit against the Toronto Blue Jays slugger "completely inappropriate and meritless."TMZ first reported Monday that the 33-year-old Encarnacion is facing a lawsuit over knowingly giving a woman whom he had unprotected sex with multiple STDs. The woman is suing the American League RBI leader for battery and misrepresentation of the facts, according to TMZ, while seeking more than $11.5 million in damages."He will take every legal measure to defend himself against this frivolous claim and will bring appropriate claims in the appropriate forums against all of the individuals seeking to exploit his financial position," Kinzer said, according to FOX Sports' Ken Rosenthal."This is an unacceptable attack on his exceptional character and stellar reputation within the baseball community as a man who carries himself with the highest level of integrity."TMZ reports that the woman is a 24-year-old family friend of Encarnacion, and that she first met the three-time All-Star in 2013. In the lawsuit, she claims to have hooked up with one of Encarnacion's teammates in 2015, but was tested for STDs in December of that year and the results came back clean.She then says she had unprotected sex with Encarnacion on at least two occasions during a trip to Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic—Encaracion's home country—in February 2016 and was in pain days after the two allegedly hooked up. The accuser apparently believed she had contracted the Zika virus and went to see a doctor where she learned that she had tested positive for STDs.From TMZ:
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Encarnacion is earning $10 million this year after the Blue Jays picked up his club option following the 2015 season. He'll enter free agency this winter as one of the top hitters available on the market. In his eighth season with the Blue Jays, Encarnacion is hitting .268/.355/.555 with an AL-best 101 RBI and 35 homers, which ranks second in the league.The woman claims she contacted Edwin—but he insisted he was clean and suggested she may have picked up [the STDs] when they went 4-wheeling and she swam in the river. The woman says Edwin later backed off his claims about being STD-free—and then stopped contacting her altogether. The woman claims she now believes he knew he was carrying STDs all along.