Former Los Angeles Angels player Ty Buttrey testified that while Tyler Skaggs may have used illicit substances he was not a drug addict, as the now-retired relief pitcher became the second of Skaggs’ former teammates to take the stand in the ongoing wrongful death trial against the ball club.
Buttrey, who spent several years in the Angels bullpen, was one of the last people to communicate with Skaggs before he was found dead in a Texas hotel room at the start of a 2019 road trip. Buttrey said he was unaware that Skaggs had used illicit opioids, and he pushed back against the allegations that Skaggs was addicted to drugs.
“I took a lot of offense to that,” Buttrey testified Wednesday, noting that he had first-hand experience with someone else who had addiction issues. “He (Skaggs) was not a drug addict. He might have used drugs.”
“For someone to be a drug addict, they have to show signs of it,” he added.
Skaggs died after snorting a counterfeit pill containing fentanyl that had been provided to him by Angels communications staffer Eric Kay, combined with oxycodone and alcohol. Kay is serving prison time for his role in Skaggs death. Jurors in the current wrongful death trial will need to decide whether the Angels knew, or at least should have known, that Kay was providing illicit pills to Skaggs and other players.
Buttrey — who is not one of the players implicated in opioid use in connection to Kay — first met Skaggs when Buttrey was traded from the Boston Red Sox at the trading deadline in 2018.
“Tyler was extremely friendly to me, and that was rare for a starting pitcher,” Buttrey said. “Tyler was a genuine person to me. He bought us very expensive dinners, took the rookies out. He didn’t have to do that. He led by example.”
Buttrey said he generally kept to himself off the field, preferring to spend time with his wife and two cats. But he described bonding with Skaggs and other players over matches of the mobile game “Clash of Clans.”
“Shohei (Ohtani) was the best, I was competitive — Tyler thought he was the best, but wasn’t,” Buttrey said jokingly about their respective skills at the video game.
Despite the stresses of being a major league pitcher, Skaggs never seemed to be scared, stressed or anxious, Buttrey testified. Other starters would get in a bad mood after a difficult start, but Skaggs maintained a steady demeanor, he added.
“At the end of the day it is just a game, but it carries a lot of pressure and stress — a lot,” Buttrey said. “I thought he handled it well, that is why I looked up to to him.”
Under questioning by attorneys for the Angels, Buttrey said that even if it had publicly come out prior to his death that Skaggs was using illicit pills, he did not believe it would have impacted Skaggs’ potential earnings or endorsements.
“Players all the time have drama that comes out and they make $300 million,” Buttrey said.
“Players beat their wives and they are still in the league,” he added.
A member of the Angels communications staff previously testified that Skaggs was not a team ace or an All-Star caliber player. Buttrey defended Skaggs, saying stats alone didn’t capture the value of Skaggs, a left-handed pitcher who Buttrey noted mixed an effective curveball with a 90 to 95 mph fastball.
“Just because you can read a stat line doesn’t mean you know how a player carries themselves off the field,” Buttrey said. “To go five innings in the big league is a tough thing to do, and he did that consistently in his career.”
Shortly after checking into their hotel on the first night of the Texas road trip, Buttrey texted Skaggs to apologize for not grabbing a speaker off the team bus. The next morning, Buttrey described waking up to see police officers and crying players in the hotel hallway.
“I was just extremely shocked and stunned,” Buttrey said of his reaction to Skaggs death. “It didn’t make sense. I was extremely confused and didn’t really process it until I was flying home that night.”
“Once I wrapped my head around it, the first thing (I realized) was I lost a great human being and an ace as a teammate,” he added.
Buttrey is the second Angels player — after star outfield Mike Trout — to take the stand in the wrongful death trial, and is the first pitcher to testify. Attorneys for the Angels have alleged that Skaggs introduced five other now-former players — Cam Bedrosian, CJ Cron, Matt Harvey, Blake Parker and Mike Morin — to illicit drugs by telling them that Kay could procure the opioid pills.
Buttrey resisted providing his opinion when asked if it was appropriate for Skaggs or other players to snort a crushed-up pill. He also avoided a question about whether it was appropriate for Skaggs to ask Kay to get him opioid pills shortly after Kay had finished a stint in rehab.
After abruptly announcing his retirement from baseball in 2021, Buttrey attempted a comeback in 2022. He spent several years in the Angels — and later the Houston Astros and Seattle Mariners — minor league systems before once again retiring in late 2024.
Late Wednesday afternoon, Skaggs’ father, Darrell, became the first of the plaintiffs to testify during the trial. The father — who has Castleman disease — testified by video from a medical facility in Oxnard.
Darrell Skaggs confirmed that he was aware that in 2013 there had been a family intervention regarding his son’s use of opioids that were not prescribed to him.
“Did you tell him that taking opioids without a prescription was dangerous to his health and career?” Angels attorney Kevin Dorse asked.
“I probably did,” Darrell Skaggs responded.
Asked what he would have done if he had been aware that his son was mixing opioids and alcohol prior to his death, Darrell Skaggs replied “I don’t know what I would have done, probably broken his neck.”
“Is it your opinion that ‘champions expect pain, endure pain and never complain’ when it comes to sports?” Dorse asked.
“I don’t know if I totally agree to that,” Darrell Skaggs said. “I understand what that means. But it isn’t my view anymore.”
In 2017, while Tyler Skaggs was trying to return from Tommy John Surgery, the father texted him about his concerns that his son’s recovery wasn’t coming along fast enough. He wrote that his son needed to “get his (expletive) together” before he got a reputation as an oft-injured player and was replaced in the starting pitcher rotation.
Testimony in the wrongful death trial will continue Friday in an Orange County Superior Courtroom in Santa Ana.
