Cleveland Indians pitcher Trevor Bauer is arguably one of the most interesting pitchers in all of baseball. Aside from his talent as a starting pitcher, Bauer has been known to make just as many headlines off of the field. Reports by Yahoo! and USA Today were used as resources for all the information used in this article.

During the 2016 playoffs, Bauer had a scheduled start pushed back after a mishap when his remote-controlled drone nearly severed one of his fingers. Bauer tried to pitch through the injury but ultimately had to leave the game once his stitches burst and kept bleeding.

Bauer's latest trip to the spotlight revolves around his arbitration battle with Cleveland this offseason.

The arbitration battle

Bauer has been outspoken about his distaste for the current arbitration system in the major leagues. A system that was designed to reward players who outplayed their initial rookie contract, in lieu of reaching free agency sooner, has become antiquated in Bauer's mind.

The way he sees it, teams are routinely taking advantage to lock in star young players for extra years by ponying up a few more dollars in the short term for vast savings over the career of the player.

When requesting his own arbitration number, Bauer opted for $6,420,969.69. While he neither drinks nor does drugs, Bauer found it amusing to make a mockery of the number presented to the arbitration court.

Ultimately, Bauer was awarded $6,525,000 for the upcoming season. Not to be outdone by the court, Bauer found an ingenious way to bring his salary back down to his original request. “That’s what I want to play for this year,” Bauer said. “I made up my mind. And since I got more than that in arbitration, I decided to give up the difference.”

The 69 days of giving

Starting with Opening Day this week, Bauer plans to give $420.69 per day to a different charity for 69 days.

The "69 Days of Giving" is a first of its kind in professional sports, as Bauer seeks to have a little fun with his charitable donations.

He has even launched a website to solicit ideas from fans on where to donate the money each day. Taiki Green, his campaign manager, will oversee the website. The end result will be $98,027.61 in donations made, along with a salary of $6,002.70 paid to Green to run the website, bringing Bauer's 2018 salary back down to his desired $6,420,969.69.

While traditional baseball fans who lament the youth movement in the game today will find this whole stunt to be atrocious, it is hard to argue with someone who is giving to charity. Bauer is clearly having fun with the whole thing and should be applauded for his commitment to giving back.
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