Another Bad Cubs Day

[billroper]

Ok, it's one thing to lose. It's another thing when your catcher punches out the opposing catcher after a play at the plate.

If I were Ozzie, I'd still be wondering why Pierzynski got thrown out of the game.

Comments

[tnatj.livejournal.com]

Saw the original incident on the ESPN baseball wrapup. My thought —

Hard slides into the plate and into/through a catcher blocking the base-path are in the game.

Laying a perfect round-house right into the side of the head of the runner in retaliation for aforesaid hard slide, is not in the game.

Baseball

[bschilli.livejournal.com]

Slapping your hand on home plate is a bit of taunt, but Pierzynski isn't the best liked player in baseball. He is a catcher, so he's been run over a few times himself. I think that he got tossed out to "even things out". I hate that sort of nonsense.

Ben

[singlemaltsilk.livejournal.com]

"f I were Ozzie, I'd still be wondering why Pierzynski got thrown out of the game."

My guess (and it's only that, a guess) would be not the slap on home plate, but the 'bump', plus whatever he said to Barrett when they were in each other's faces, plus the reputation Pierzynski has as a troublemaker.

Don't get me wrong; I'm appalled at what Barrett did. He was righteously thrown out of the game, deserves to receive a suspension, and ought to be fined by both MLB and the Cubs. Frankly, I wouldn't mind seeing him face assault charges.

But I suspect Pierzynski deserved his expulsion as well.

[bschilli.livejournal.com]

That's what I meant. Slapping the plate was a bit out of line, but not even close to deserving an ejection.

I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for the law getting involved. Ed Farmer promised he'd take criminal action against Al Cowens. Nothing came of that.

For those of you who don't know the story, Ed Farmer hit Al Cowens with a pitch May 8, 1979. Cowens jaw was broken. The next year Cowens hit a ball to shortstop and went directly after Farmer. Cowens got a seven game suspension. Farmer never filed charges. That was also a White Sox home game.

Ben

[singlemaltsilk.livejournal.com]

"I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for the law getting involved."

Yeah, not exactly holding my breath on that one...

[billroper]

Slapping the plate is what baseball players are trained to do, if there's any possible doubt in their mind as to whether or not they actually touched home in a collision like that. The replays of the "bump" look to me more like Barrett running into Pierzynski than vice versa. Apparently, Pierzynski didn't say anything to Barrett. Barrett seems to have said, "I didn't have the ball, obscenity deleted," and then clocked Pierzynski before he had a chance to respond.

Pierzynski seems to have been ejected from the game before Barrett was, because Ozzie had to come out and find out why Barrett was still catching warmup pitches from Hill after the brawl. At that point, the umpires conferred and determined that, just maybe, Barrett ought to go.

The umpires blew this hide, wide, and handsome when they ejected Pierzynski, unless something happened in the dogpile that we didn't see. Which is always possible...

[singlemaltsilk.livejournal.com]

I suspect you've watched the replays a lot more than I have ;)

[billroper]

A few more times than daisy_knotwise had in mind, that's for sure. :)

More than "Any possible" doubt

[hvideo.livejournal.com]

When I saw the replays on the news, I had some doubt in my mind as to whether Pierzynski had touched the plate during the initial collision or not. So making sure (by slapping the plate when he did) was absolutely the right thing to do. I will admit that he did it with more zest than needed, but it was certainly no worse than many other "celebrating getting to home" things I've seen on a routine basis (jumping a bit to land with both feet together on home plate, etc.).

My guess is that Barrett took the enthusiastic hand "plate slap" to be an "In your face, I knocked the ball away" statement by Pierzynski, thus triggering Barrett's "I didn't have the ball..." comment and punch.

Finally!

[daddy-guido.livejournal.com]

A baseball game with some ACTION in it!