Zack Greinke rips Brewers' Ryan Braun for 'using' his teammates

Former Brewers pitcher Zack Greinke said Ryan Braun was "so convincing" in lying to teammates about his innocence. (Christian Petersen/Getty Images) Dodgers

Former Brewers pitcher Zack Greinke said Ryan Braun was "so convincing" in lying to teammates about his innocence. (Christian Petersen/Getty Images)

Dodgers pitcher Zack Greinke, who spent a year and a half with the Brewers, ripped suspended Milwaukee slugger Ryan Braun for lying to and manipulating his teammates in comments to The Los Angeles Times' Dylan Hernandez on Friday.

After asking for two days to collect his thoughts, Greinke, like Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers, said that Braun told the Brewers that he had done nothing wrong after successfully overturning a positive performance-enhancing drug test in 2011.

Braun was suspended for the rest of the 2013 season on Monday, accepting a 65-game penalty for his ties to the Biogenesis clinic.

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From the Los Angeles Times report:

"The main thing is, yeah, he lied to us," Greinke said. "He forced us to lie for him, threw people under the bus in order to help himself out and didn't care, blamed others for his mistakes and it’s just a lot of things you don’t expect from people."

Greinke added that while teammates believed Braun when he maintained his innocence, but that in hindsight Braun was simply using his teammates.

"Oh, yeah, 100% believed him," Greinke said. "Everything was so convincing. He had people to blame. He seemed like a really good guy. He was a good teammate at the time. You don’t know the guys that he was pinning it on. I'm not positive, but I think everyone 100% believed him at the time. Especially the next year, he looked just as good as the year before. His numbers his whole career, Hall of Fame numbers. How could you not believe him? He was so convincing." "The fact that even to this day he hasn’t had a real apology is really upsetting to me," Greinke said. "I thought about it a bunch. He still hasn’t really apologized."

Asked whether his opinion on Braun as a player changed, Greinke replied, "Not even talking about the player. It’s just the person. Just the fact that he was willing to use anyone that got in his path. The closer you were to him, the more he would use you. It's just disappointing that a human being could be like that."

Greinke was also disappointed that Braun still hasn’t issued "a real apology."