The Los Angeles Dodgers are fighting for a spot in the World Series, and Mexican-American first baseman Adrián González has been trapped in the unwanted eye of the presidential hurricane.

When the Dodgers played the Chicago Cubs back in May, González did not stay at Trump International Hotel and Tower. As the name implies, the property is owned by Republican presidential candidate Donald J. Trump.

González told the L.A. Times that his hotel request became public only because a team broadcaster shared the information with a newspaper reporter over the weekend, as the Cubs hosted the Dodgers in the first two games of the National League Championship Series. This time, none of the Dodgers stayed at Trump’s hotel because a downpayment is required and the team had no way of knowing that their playoff games would take place in Chicago.

“I don’t want this to be a story,” González said to the L.A. Times. “I did it for myself.”

However, liberal pro-Hillary Clinton media outlets are using this incident to reflect poorly on Trump. Another example of using old dirt would be the audio file from 11 years ago that recently surfaced of Trump saying vulgarly inappropriate and borderline sexual-assault comments about women and also highlighting the multiple witnesses coming forward accusing Trump of sexual assault.

While these occurrences speak highly about Trump’s personal attitudes and strengthen national divisions, they are not necessarily swaying those who support him. This old news just adds more fuel to the fire for voters already opposing Trump. More importantly, these old accounts are chewing up air time during the debates that should be used to talk about intended presidential policies and progressive discussion.

San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick is clearly taking a political stance against racial inequality and disapproval for both presidential candidates, but González is not.

“I wasn’t doing it for publicity, I wasn’t doing it for people to look at me or talk about me,” González said. “That’s not who I am. I just have my own values and morals that I want to live by.”

González is not vocal in advocating for social justice issues or approving/disapproving presidential candidates. His neutrality is respectfully professional. There’s a fine line between being patriotic and political, and A-Gon is careful not to cross it.

Born in San Diego, González grew up playing baseball in Tijuana, Mexico. He wears a red, white and blue jersey on the Fourth of July and a mariachi outfit in the locker room on Mexican Independence Day. He plays for a team that is beloved by Mexican-Americans and is culturally accepting of Latino heritage.

Trump’s comments about Mexican immigrants being “racists” that are “bringing crime” and “drugs,” as well as Trump’s “build a wall and make Mexico pay for it” line, and the fact that Trump took issue with the Mexican-American federal judge hearing a case filed against his self-named Trump University do not sit well with many Mexican-Americans.

“You can draw your own conclusions. They’re probably right,” González said when asked to elaborate his political stance.

Nonetheless, González has never publicly countered Trump, so it is unfair that he is receiving so much stereotypical hate speech for actions intended to be discreet. He also shouldn’t be hailed as a hero because he’s just trying to do his job while staying out of drama.

It’s also unfair that this slugger now has to focus on dodging media questions instead of hitting homeruns. This unwanted political distraction is taking media focus away from the the MLB playoffs and the final presidential debate – which are both happening live now.

González was the first baseball player to hit a homerun in the 2016 postseason, which gave the Dodgers a 1-0 win in Game 2. But now the only thing people care about is that he made arrangements to stay at a different hotel than the rest of his team five months ago.

“I didn’t stay there,” González said, standing by his hotel boycott. “I had my reasons… We’re here to play baseball not talk politics.”