User Comments, Suggestions, or Complaints | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | Advertising
Buy MLB playoff tickets, plus 2011 World Series, 2011 ALCS tickets and NLCS game tickets. We also have Texas Rangers playoff schedule, tickets to Red Sox games and Yankees game tickets. Plus, buy Phillies baseball tickets, Tigers playoff tickets and the biggies like ALDS baseball tickets and 2011 NLDS tickets. |
Demarini, Easton and TPX Baseball Bats
|
AllianceTickets.com has cheap MLB Tickets. Get all your Colorado Rockies Tickets, Seattle Mariners Tickets, San Francisco Giants Tickets and all your favorite baseball tickets here. We also carry cheap Denver Broncos Tickets, Seattle Seahawks Tickets and Denver Nuggets Tickets. |
Page rendered in 0.3225 seconds
54 querie(s) executed
Reader Comments and Retorts
Go to end of page
Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.
1. Rich Posted: April 18, 2008 at 12:50 PM (#2749443)I don't know what the intent of the respective pitchers was, but I would agree that both were reckless.
I think the overriding issue is that the Sox have always thrown inside against the Yankees. The Yankees have not, but now things have changed.
I hope both sides are more careful in the future.
Pedro and other Red Sox have thrown plenty of horseshit pitches too over the years, but that pitch was absolute horseshit.
I have no problem with the teams both reclaiming the inside part of the plate. So, I don't have an issue when someone like Youk gets hit for it and assume thoughtful Yankee fans don't when ARod or Jeter does, either. The Yankees have had more plate-divers than the Sox over the last few years, which should be mentioned whenever someone mentions the history of throwing inside as well. Manny is not one of those guys, obviously, so it's a little different when he's hit for just hitting well as opposed to one of the many plate divers on either team being hit, imo.
It is not true that the location on those two pitches (the one to ARod and the one to Manny) were very close. Farnsworth probably tried to throw it in a similar place and missed, because he pretty much sucks, but let's not misrepresent where it ended up, either...the pitches were 18 inches or more apart in location and that's a big difference.
Just to be clear, throwing at or behind someone's head is not ok. I hope people recognize that brushing back and throwing at or behind someone's head are very different things, too. Last year people were defending a pitch by someone's head as brushing back a plate diver and that's just wrong, imo
It is not true that the location on those two pitches (the one to ARod and the one to Manny) were very close. Farnsworth probably tried to throw it in a similar place and missed, because he pretty much sucks, but let's not misrepresent where it ended up, either...the pitches were 18 inches or more apart in location and that's a big difference.
Just to be clear, throwing at or behind someone's head is not ok. I hope people recognize that brushing back and throwing at or behind someone's head are very different things, too. Last year people were defending a pitch by someone's head as brushing back a plate diver and that's just wrong, imo
My perception after watching the replay is that the pitches were two to three inches apart. I didn't think that was the case until I re-watched it.
I think both teams should be far more careful.
I actually checked out the BronxBanter chatter reaction to the pitch, and as intelligent as they usually seem over there, they were all "YAY FARNSWORTH". Oh well. I wonder what RPYW thought?
"We hit one of the best players and I guess they want to send a message and that's what they did. They've got to back up their players and he did."
Sounds like no one is outraged except Curt Schilling, Peter Gammons and probably whoever he was with in the Sox ownership box.
Seems like an ugly twist of the Maddux gambit.
And kevin. kevin is outraged too. Joba got a two game suspension for allegedly throwing at Youk, Torre must have been out of town that day.
I don't believe in starting these kinds of things. I do believe in finishing them. What Farnsworth did was completely wrong. Retaliation, with the intent of putting a player on the DL, would have been completely right.
Actually, I think what started it was when you had to bring up the HPB disparity to everyone's attention (with an assist from the borrowers at ESPN).:)
What baseball needs is for the 25th man to be a reserve outfielder goon type. You wouldn't even need to take Beckett out of the game, just put the goon in the outfield, swap him in when ARod comes to the plate, throw at Arod's head and get ready to rumble.
You mean the baseball equivalent of Donald Brashear? Hopefully without the domestic violence.
2004 when they threw at Kenny Lofton's head 3 times in 1 ab?
Then Lofton elbows Eyechart in the head. Then Lowell "ran into" Cano last year.
Really? When has Beckett headhunted? Or Clemens? I'm being serious, I don't remember any instances.
EDIT: Maybe I'm crazy, but I assumed Clemens didn't mean to hit Piazza in the head. Hit him, sure. But not in the head.
Lofton probably deserved it, but the larger point, is, who "starts" it. Maybe in Farnsworth's mind, he feels ARod getting hit that high the night before deserved retaliation. Who knows, but this stuff goes back a while.
Did he just hit him or hit him in the head? Are we seriously not acknowledging the difference between hitting somebody and "headhunting?" Worlds apart. I will cede to you that Beckett is a jerk. But drilling somebody in the back, butt, or leg is not the same as throwing up around someone's head. Isn't that obvious?
Then Julian Tavarez is safe as long as Joseph Merrick stays dead.
The only time I can remember Beckett retaliating was last September, when he hit Giambi in the hip after Wang put Youkilis out of the game with a HBP.
I have yet to see Joba convicted in a court of law. The intent remains "alleged."
Disappointing that you choose to play that game, I think, but your choice.
The infamous game where Pedro sent Jeter and Soriano to the hospital... they usually leave the part of the story out where the day before, Clemens is getting shelled by the Red Sox... and after a Big Papi homerun, the next pitch hits Millar right in the head. (The next pitch was a Trot Nixon homerun). Pedro retaliated the next day, since Wakefield was Clemen's opposing pitcher.
And, if not getting embarassed was enough for the Rocket, his post-game comments were mostly veiled threats that he was going to throw at Ortiz next game.
Clemens is a piece of garbage and I'm glad he's out of baseball.
Yeah probably. I sleep ok at night though.
You can say this all you want. The stats make it clear, the Red Sox hit double the number of Yankees from 2000-2004, or whenever I did that tally. Just ask Bill Simmons.
I bet if you take out Wakefield, who is a consistent league leader in hit batsmen, it's probably about even.
Its not.
From 2000-2004, the Yankees hit 264 opposing batters, while the Red Sox hit 402. The Yankees took 352 HBP, the Red Sox 305. You add those together, and they account for almost the entire HBP differential.
Maybe that's because the Red Sox pitchers were a bunch of jerky jerks and the Yankee pitchers love kittens wrapped in babies, but it's not becuase of anything particular going on between the Red Sox and Yankees. The Red Sox were jerky jerks to everyone, and the Yankees served hot tea and warm towels for everyone. Or, if you prefer not to make moral judgments on a characteristic that is not necessarily related to anything moral (Tim Wakefield is consistently high in HBP, for instance), it was just a function of personnel.
We have this discussion every year, seemingly.
This has been going on for awhile. And I laugh when I read things like #2.
Pedro hits people because he's a team player.
Farnsworth hit Manny because the Yankees are frustrated with 7+ years of constant, often times humiliating, failure... failure after failure after failure... and Manny's two HRs last night just reminded them that, no matter how hard they dream, wish and pray... they'll never be as good as Manny unless they do something to bring Manny down.
My outrage has calmed some. I did not get indignant when they came up and in on ARod the previous night, after his long homer in the first.
And no matter how hard they dream wish and pray, they will never be as good as ARod.
1) If, in an umpire's estimation, a pitcher has intentionally thrown at a hitter, he is immediately ejected from the current game, and the commissioner's office reviews the play, taking into consideration any defense offered by the player, for a possible suspension and/or fines based on intent.*
2) If a pitcher hits a batter in the head at any time, he is immediately ejected and suspended for some period of time, and the commissioner's office reviews the play, taking into consideration any defense offered by the player, for a potentially longer suspension and/or fines based on intent.
The first change eliminates the unfair "warning" system and really doesn't give the umpire any more discretion than he has now. The second puts pitchers on notice that hitting a batter in the head always has consequences regardless of intent, and has very serious consequences if ruled to be intentional.
*The current rule for reference: Rule 8.02(d) (Intentionally Pitch at the Batter)
This was what really struck me about it. When I heard the story I pictured behavior totally different from what I then saw on the replays. On both homers he was out of the batter's box faster than you pretty much ever see him.
You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
<< Back to main