A punch in the nuts
Posted by Michael.
Well, not quite, but still this
doesn’t look comfy.
The back story is that a couple days ago, a Tampa player was trying to score but the NYY backup catcher was blocking the plate. It’s common baseball knowledge to not slide into the catcher’s shinguards so instead you just try to run him over. Because it was spring training, or something (I think it was mostly new manager Joe Girardi establishing himself with his team) the Yankees were very vocal about being upset. Then in the next game, Shelley Duncan gave the Rays secondbaseman the Jackie Robinson treatment. Wasn’t cool then, isn’t cool now, Shelley. (Then again, with a name like that, he’s gotta overcompensate for something.)
The Tampa manager summed up my feelings pretty well: “In Tampa, that play you saw at home plate was a good, hard baseball play. What you saw today was the definition of a dirty play… There’s no room for that in our game. It’s contemptable. It’s wrong. It’s borderline criminal, and I could not believe they did that.”
March 14th, 2008 at 10:57 am Using
Yeah, that’s a pretty dirty play there. But, really, I’m not surprised by it. Not like we haven’t seen some dirty plays from them before.
March 15th, 2008 at 2:46 am Using
Actually, I have to disagree - with the possible exception of A-rod’s slap vs BOS, I don’t think that the Yankees have been a dirty team in a long time, certainly not since Joe Torre signed on.
And really, I think that Girardi HAD to come out and publicly complain about the collision - a minor league player on his team broke a bone, and he’s the new manager… he has to say something and stand up for his guy, to let his players know that he’s got their backs. The problem lies with Duncan either twisting those comments or taking the initiative and kicking people in the nuts.
For the record, too, I’ve seen headlines that “veteran players” have taken Duncan aside to let him know that what he did is not cool. So hopefully things can settle down. Girardi should be suspended a game (just like when a pitcher is ejected for hitting a batter) and Duncan should be fined, but hopefully that’s the end of it. Until Clemens has ‘roid rage and throws a bat at Mike Piazza (again).