FILIA Eric

General
CLUB JOURNEY
He was selected by the Seattle Mariners in the 20th round, 597th overall pick, of the 2016 MLB Draft. In 2016 he played 68 games for the Mariners' minor league affiliate team the Everett AquaSox, and one game for the Triple-A level Tacoma Rainiers. He continued playing in the minors in 2017 and 2018 at Double-A level before progressing to Triple-A in 2019 and 2021 with the Tacoma Rainiers. (milb.com, 01 Jul 2021)

BASEBALL BROTHERS
His younger brother Mikey was drafted by the Kansas City Royals in 2019 while his other younger brother Marc 'Bubba' was playing for University of California, San Diego in 2021 in his sophomore year. Bubba says the three brothers grew up competitive with one another. "It was really competitive, especially being the youngest, I looked up to both of [my brothers] and they're both my heroes and best friends. All three of us are really close and it was definitely super competitive." (ucsdtritons.com, 04 Jun 2021)

DISCIPLINARY INCIDENTS
He has tested positive for undisclosed 'drugs of abuse' on three occasions, and has been sanctioned twice. In 2018 he was suspended for the first 50 games of the season after testing positive in January that year, and in 2019 he was suspended for 100 games following a positive test in March that year. Previously, in 2014 while taking classes at the University of California, Los Angeles, he was caught plagiarising part of a paper and was suspended for the remainder of the year, including for the 2015 baseball season. During his absence from school, he worked a series of jobs, including as an in-house butler at the Playboy mansion. He was reinstated by UCLA in 2016, when he also rejoined the baseball team. (seattletimes.com, 12 Jan 2018; milb.com, 22 Mar 2019)

In 2013 he was part of the first University of California, Los Angeles [UCLA] Bruins team to win a national championship, following an 8-0 victory over Mississippi State University in the College World Series in Omaha, Nebraska. Before joining the college he had told his father, Mike, that he had chosen to study at UCLA because it had never won a national baseball championship. (ocregister.com, 30 Jun 2013)