• Home
  • About me: Jim Fitzpatrick
  • Contact

JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC

Feeds:
Posts
Comments
« Two provocative questions: How long will it take to get a modern airport, and can Southwest High rise again?
Pope Francis finally pulls the trigger — the Bishop who failed to protect Kansas City children is OUTTA HERE! »

Royals win weekend series in dramatic fashion but foolishly expose themselves to dangerous retaliation

April 19, 2015 by jimmycsays

Understandably, much of Kansas City — including the Fitzpatrick household — has been in a near frenzy since Friday’s Royals-Oakland A’s game, when A’s third baseman Brett Lawrie barreled into Royals’ shortstop Alcides Escobar with spikes high, spraining Escobar’s left knee.

Lawrie’s intimidating and dangerous move set off a retaliation sequence that probably won’t end with the last out of Sunday’s game, which the Royals won 4-2, thanks to dramatic eighth-inning doubles by Lorenzo Cain and Kendrys Morales.

I was at Sunday’s game, and it was one of the most intense regular-season games I have ever seen.

But after thinking about all that happened during the three games and reading reports by Royals’ and Athletics’ reporters, I am afraid that the Royals ultimately sacrificed the moral high ground, if you will.

On the Kansas City end, the refrain from Kansas City Star reporters and Royals TV and radio commentators is something like, “These Royals will not back down.” (That’s the headline on Vahe Gregorian’s column on The Star’s website tonight.)

Not surprisingly, Oakland reporters see it through a different-colored lens.

Consider this from a blog post tonight by John Hickey, A’s beat reporter for the Oakland Tribune.

The Royals were the best feel-good story of 2014, a scrappy, hustling team that put a full-court press on opponents and ran them out of the gym, in the process running themselves into the World Series.

Six months later, the Royals have an entirely different persona. They’ve become angry. They’ve become nasty.

With hostilities unresolved and clashing perspectives abounding, the next Royals-A’s series — in Oakland at the end of June — is likely to be very ugly. There will almost surely be some hit batters, and it wouldn’t surprise me at all if there’s a big fight.

The Royals ceded the high ground, in my opinion, with two specific actions — one Saturday and one Sunday.

Incident No. 1

Everyone within a two-hour drive of Kansas City is now aware that Royals’ pitcher Yordano Ventura plunked Lawrie in the elbow in Saturday’s game, which the A’s won 5-0.

Ventura was perfectly justified in hitting Ventura to even the score for Lawrie’s reckless slide into Escobar the night before.

But here’s where Ventura screwed up — and, perhaps tellingly, I got this from an Oakland reporter’s account, not from anything I heard or read in in local reports:

Ventura apparently smiled at Lawrie after hitting him…Not smart.

One of the worst things a player can do under baseball’s unwritten rules is to show up an opponent. It’s OK to exact non-lethal revenge against an opponent, but you can’t give him the “gotcha” smile when you do it. You keep a straight face, turn your back and act like nothing out of the ordinary happened.

But Ventura, a young and emotional guy, indulged himself in obvious delight when he evened the score.

Lawrie, for his part, was professional. He didn’t even look at Ventura. He was expecting to be hit; took the pitch in the elbow; and headed straight to first base.

Normally, that would have been the end of the skirmish: You got us; we got you.

But it resumed anew on Sunday, and — who knows? — maybe that damned smile was responsible.

Incident No. 2

I arrived in the bottom of the first inning, and as I walked along the concourse behind the seating area, thunderous booing was underway. I looked up at a monitor in time to see Royals’ manager Ned Yost giving an incredible ass chewing to home plate umpire Greg Gibson. Their faces were so close that if Yost had bad breath, Gibson would be able to report if it was from onions or bananas.

After Gibson gave Yost the heave-ho, I asked a bystander what I had missed. I was told A’s pitcher Scott Kazmir had hit Cain with a pitch…Hit him in the foot, I learned later.

I also learned later that pitching coach Dave Eiland had gotten tossed before Yost. Apparently both were arguing — probably sprinkling their assertions with the verboten “f” word — that Kazmir should be thrown out out of the game, just as Ventura had been kicked out Saturday after hitting Lawrie.

Ejecting Kazmir might have calmed things down, but he stayed in the game, and the Royals decided more retaliation was in order.

It came in the top of the eighth. With Lawrie at the plate and the game tied 2-2, Royals’ reliever Kelvin Herrera threw a low and inside pitch that made Lawrie do a little jump-back. Watching from my seat behind the netting on the first-base side of home plate, I thought that might be sufficient.

kelvin

Kelvin Herrera being ushered off the field Sunday

But no. On the next pitch Herrera threw a fastball behind Lawrie’s head. Gibson, the home plate umpire, immediately threw Herrera out of the game. Just as quickly, Herrera gave up the ability to claim the wild pitch was accidental: On the way to the dugout, glowering at Lawrie, he pointed to his own head and mouthed some words.

Lawrie and the rest of the A’s interpreted that to mean Herrera had intended to hit him in the head. “He needs to pay for that,” Lawrie said after the game.

For his part, Herrera said he yelled, “Think about it,” at Lawrie while making the finger-to-head motion.

…Two problems for the Royals here: First, you should never throw at or near a player’s head intentionally. Obviously, that could result in serious injury or even death. That’s going over the line…And then, to point to his head, regardless of what message he was trying to send to Lawrie, was incredibly ill advised.

More than protecting his teammates — which is what a retaliatory pitch is intended to do — Herrera put his teammates in harm’s way. When the Royals go to the Oakland Coliseum in June, I will be watching and cringing with every A’s pitch to — or at — Royals’ batters.

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook

Like this:

Like Loading...

Related

Posted in Uncategorized | 5 Comments

5 Responses

  1. on April 20, 2015 at 4:57 am John Blakeney

    Sounds to me that Royal’s baseball has become interesting!!! Although I don’t support intentional throws to the head…if there is no blood…let it go.


  2. on April 20, 2015 at 5:25 pm Jason Schneider

    I was at Friday’s game. Had a great time!

    You just witnessed passionate baseball. I know you probably don’t recognize it, because it was gone from KC for soooo many years. But now we have a team that is stuck together like glue, and a fan base that loves them. Enjoy it!

    My opinion about the beanballs, if Hererra was throwing at Lawries’ head, then the argument could be made that Kazmir was trying to hit Cain in the knee. They both missed by about the same margin.

    Also, I hope you didn’t eat a hot dog at the game…someone in our section passed around a hot dog that looked like it was from 1985. Even the one I had seen on the news this weekend, paled in comparison to this piece of scalded tripe that was burned beyond recognition. The only clue that it was in fact a hot dog, was the dried up piece of bread that resembled a bun. Seriously, I would have felt safer eating the foil wrapper that hid the atrocity inside of it.

    Go Royals!!!!!!!!


    • on April 20, 2015 at 5:55 pm jimmycsays

      Good to hear from you, Jason. Friday was a great game, too. We watched it on TV and went crazy in the living room. Jeff Montgomery was steaming about Lawrie’s slide and said the Royals needed to “take care of business.” I’d like to know what he thinks about how it played out over the next two games. Brian McRae was on the radio with Soren Petro today, and he didn’t particularly care for the way the Royals handled the retribution. He said it would have been better if Omar Infante had jumped on Lawrie then and there and punched him a couple of times. But Omar is a little guy and seems pretty mild mannered. He probably didn’t give serious consideration to throwing punches. Next time something like that happens, though, I think immediate retribution is the way to go.

      …I usually just have a Pepsi and a pretzel. Hard to screw up that order.


  3. on April 20, 2015 at 9:29 pm Jimmy Bullabrew

    Don’t kid yourselves, the A’s are still pissed off about losing that playoff game…and remember, Escobar played in all our games last year…the status quo doesn’t like it when the little guy gets up and takes the spotlight…if baseball didn’t get the message before, Kelvin delivered it in no uncertain terms: It ends here. period. We are NOT playing.


    • on April 20, 2015 at 10:38 pm jimmycsays

      Readers: This from a guy who wears baseball on his sleeve, literally. Every day a jersey from one major league team or another is on his back. This was the case even when “JimmyB” was teaching social studies at Shawnee Mission North. Every day was dress down day for JimmyB.



Comments are closed.

  • Pages

    • About me: Jim Fitzpatrick
    • Contact
  • Archives

    • January 2023
    • December 2022
    • November 2022
    • October 2022
    • September 2022
    • August 2022
    • July 2022
    • June 2022
    • May 2022
    • April 2022
    • March 2022
    • February 2022
    • January 2022
    • December 2021
    • November 2021
    • October 2021
    • September 2021
    • August 2021
    • July 2021
    • June 2021
    • May 2021
    • April 2021
    • March 2021
    • February 2021
    • January 2021
    • December 2020
    • November 2020
    • October 2020
    • September 2020
    • August 2020
    • July 2020
    • June 2020
    • May 2020
    • April 2020
    • March 2020
    • February 2020
    • January 2020
    • December 2019
    • November 2019
    • October 2019
    • September 2019
    • August 2019
    • July 2019
    • June 2019
    • May 2019
    • April 2019
    • March 2019
    • February 2019
    • January 2019
    • December 2018
    • November 2018
    • October 2018
    • September 2018
    • August 2018
    • July 2018
    • June 2018
    • May 2018
    • April 2018
    • March 2018
    • February 2018
    • January 2018
    • December 2017
    • November 2017
    • October 2017
    • September 2017
    • August 2017
    • July 2017
    • June 2017
    • May 2017
    • April 2017
    • March 2017
    • February 2017
    • January 2017
    • December 2016
    • November 2016
    • October 2016
    • September 2016
    • August 2016
    • July 2016
    • June 2016
    • May 2016
    • April 2016
    • March 2016
    • February 2016
    • January 2016
    • December 2015
    • November 2015
    • October 2015
    • September 2015
    • August 2015
    • July 2015
    • June 2015
    • May 2015
    • April 2015
    • March 2015
    • February 2015
    • January 2015
    • December 2014
    • November 2014
    • October 2014
    • September 2014
    • August 2014
    • July 2014
    • June 2014
    • May 2014
    • April 2014
    • March 2014
    • February 2014
    • January 2014
    • December 2013
    • November 2013
    • October 2013
    • September 2013
    • August 2013
    • July 2013
    • June 2013
    • May 2013
    • April 2013
    • March 2013
    • February 2013
    • January 2013
    • December 2012
    • November 2012
    • May 2012
    • April 2012
    • March 2012
    • February 2012
    • January 2012
    • December 2011
    • November 2011
    • October 2011
    • September 2011
    • August 2011
    • July 2011
    • June 2011
    • May 2011
    • April 2011
    • March 2011
    • February 2011
    • January 2011
    • December 2010
    • November 2010
    • October 2010
    • September 2010
    • August 2010
    • July 2010
    • June 2010
    • May 2010
    • April 2010
    • March 2010
  • Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

    Join 562 other subscribers

Blog at WordPress.com.

WPThemes.


  • Follow Following
    • JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC
    • Join 562 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Copy shortlink
    • Report this content
    • View post in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...
 

    %d bloggers like this: