Ah, the unwritten rules, one of which seems to have overruled the other. Vaporizing at least one written rule in the bargain. Launching a rather lugubrious scrum between the Washington Nationals and the Florida Marlins Wednesday.
And to think that I was probably supposed to think about Manny Ramirez wearing out his second welcome in three years, which isn't quite as proficient an alienation performance as those of Jose Guillen or Milton Bradley, and which may be the most polite way to describe how Ramirez becomes Ozzie Guillen's latest helpmate/headache, depending.
But anyone who tells me that the Marlins weren't itching to send Nyjer Morgan a message before he thought about stealing a base or two following plunk number one should go back to watching golf.
Here it was: top of the fourth, Chris Volstad on the mound for the Fish, Morgan at the plate, and Morgan takes one in the back. No sweat. Part of the game. Everyone in the house knew the Fish were probably crying foul when Morgan plowed Florida catcher Brett Hayes into a separated shoulder on a play at the plate (trying to score while his mates were hitting into a 10th-inning double play) the night before.
Forget the unwritten rules for a moment. The written rules (you can look it up, ladies and gentlemen) say catchers cannot block the plate. If Brett Hayes and his teammates didn't know that, they were taught that lesson in rather dramatic manner. Morgan has his issues, of course — the lad is a boor who seems often enough to cross a few lines even among his own mates — but he wasn't necessarily trying to divorce Hayes from his shoulder, either. (This, folks, was regular-season league competition, not an All-Star Game.)
Everybody with me? So far, so good. Now there isn't a jury in this world that would rule Volstad unjustified for sending Morgan a little message in the fourth. That's baseball, folks. You got my guy, I'm going to get you. Volstad got Morgan. End of conversation.
Apparently, what really got under the Fish's scales was Morgan stealing two bases after the fourth-inning flog. What steamed the Fish, or at least their first baseman Gaby Sanchez, was that the Nats were already down eleven runs when Morgan launched his crime spree. Here's Sanchez to Sirius/XM:
When he got to first he ends up stealing second and then stealing third, down by 11. And that's the whole gist of the conversation that I heard. You really don't do that in baseball. I can understand if it was a four-run lead and they hit you on purpose and you go ahead and steal second and steal third, then I don't think it's anything of a big deal. But when the team's down by 11, we're not really holding him on, we're not really doing anything, and he ends up stealing second and stealing third? I know that a lot of the guys were upset about the whole situation. So just try to hit him again kind of thing.
Let's see. With nobody holding him on, Morgan steals second. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't a bird flip to the team that just drilled him. The Nats are 11 runs down, the Marlins aren't even bothering to hold him on, do you think that even a flake like Morgan isn't thinking that, just maybe, his team could use a little ignition?
Since when are you supposed to just take it like a manperson and let the other guys continue the steamrolling when you're down 11 already? And since when, knowing the man just stole one, are you not holding him on since he's already shown intent aplenty that he has grand theft on his mind? Call me irresponsible if you must, but don't you learn as early as the Little League that if a guy steals one he's not exactly allergic to stealing another?
If you think the Marlins wouldn't have done any and everything they could think of to close an eleven run deficit if their guy got first base on the house, regardless of the circumstances that brought him there in the first place, you're dreaming as deeply as Gaby Sanchez. The Marlins ought to be grateful that Morgan didn't even think about trying to steal home.
Where the Marlins crossed the line was two innings later, with Morgan at the plate again. This time, they were steamed over the twin thefts. This time, Volstad sailed one behind Morgan's belt. That was just begging for trouble, which is precisely what Volstad got for his trouble, when Morgan charged the mound and swung a roundhouse that grazed the pitcher just moments before Sanchez sailed in for the clothesline that sent Morgan on his butt, his batting helmet a few feet away from his corpus, and both sides pouring onto the field.
And there was more to come from Sanchez to Sirius/XM:
I'm trying to protect Chris Volstad as much as I can in that situation. I wish that I could have gotten there before so he couldn't take a swing at Volstad and I could try to get to the middle of it. He's very quick, and he's the only one who knew what he was gonna do. I kind of knew in the back of my head there was a chance he would charge if he gets hit again, but he kind of stayed for a second and then all of a sudden threw his bat and then started to run, so he kind of got everybody by surprise. In that situation, I just try to do whatever I can to try to protect my pitcher and get him off him.
Now, are you ready to hear a little common sense from an unexpected source? As in, a source who just so happened to lose his job as a Nats television broadcaster because he was damn fool enough to think Stephen Strasburg should have sucked it up and pitch through the pain — which is just about what got a) the fool in question a very short career as a useful and once great relief pitcher; and, b) Strasburg looking at Tommy John surgery and more than a year, possibly, off the job?
Brace yourselves:
You get hit the first time, that should take care of it. Don't hit our catcher anymore, don't do that kind of stuff. But then the second time, okay, that's a little overkill ... And you know what, [Morgan] gave away a foot in that fight. And if you think the guy's intentionally trying to hurt you or throw at you, you've got to do something ... How are you upset that the other guy's stealing when he's down 11 runs? You should be thankful, saying, listen, he's really rolling the dice. If he gets thrown out, he's gonna be in big trouble by his team and his manager.
— Rob Dibble, once a pitcher who didn't think twice about throwing at hitters who'd committed far lesser offences than stealing twice on him following a plunk
"But it's over now," Sanchez added. "Things are done. So you've just got to continue playing. And we've still got another three games against them, and I'm pretty sure that all of this is done with." And there's still a ballpark in Brooklyn at 55 Sullivan Place.
It isn't easy to stand up for Morgan. He did, after all, plow St. Louis Cardinals catcher Bryan Anderson last Saturday night, even though Anderson had stepped in front of the plate, not quite blocking it, causing Anderson a shoulder injury and Nats manager Jim Riggleman to call his own player "unprofessional." (In fairness: Morgan said afterward he'd been duped into thinking Anderson had the ball. Well, now. Oncoming runner thinks plate-blocking catcher has the ball, violating the rules while he's at it; oncoming runner isn't in the mood to just accept fate. That, too, happens in baseball.) And Morgan is appealing a seven-game siddown-and-shaddap over tossing a ball to a fan in Citizens Bank Ballpark last month that happened to hit the fan, who's refusing to sue.
"Remember," Dibble continued, "[Morgan's] mentality is aggressiveness all the time."
He played many years of junior hockey. This doesn't excuse some of the things he's done, especially the shot he took at the Cardinals' catcher. It was uncalled for to run over the catcher. But that being said, the first pitch in the back with a 92-mile-an-hour fastball should be like, listen, quit playing out of control, get yourself under control, and let's play some baseball. But on the second one, you have to defend yourself. And I've had guys charge at me, and I've said this after the fight, I would say, 'Listen, if you felt that I was throwing at you and it was intentional, you have every right to defend yourself'.
It isn't easy saying Rob Dibble is right, considering how easy it seems to say he's been wrong before. Especially on the heels of when he was, regarding Strasburg, dramatically enough wrong to lose one of his jobs.
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Situation update: Morgan was suspended eight games Friday for the brawl. Volstad was suspended six.
Whatever his doings or undoings prior to Wednesday night's wrangling and tangling, would someone care to explain why the victim — and, yes, Morgan was the victim Wednesday, unless you think getting thrown at a second time in three innings for a warped interpretation of the "unwritten rules" equals justice or an actual or alleged bad guy has no claim to victimhood even once — got the worst of it?
Or is there another unwritten rule that a player facing suspension already in a separate incident has no business taking umbrage when he's thrown at twice in three innings in a game he's playing while appealing the earlier suspension?
Next week's set between the Fish and the Nats is going to be extremely interesting. Considering how futile were the umps' warnings after Wednesday's sixth-inning soiree (Nats pitcher Doug Slaten winged one at Sanchez over the clothesline hit on Morgan at the mound despite the warnings), that is...
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