Bud Selig approves of MLB bean-ball culture
Major League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig has a long history of being slow to change the sport of baseball for the better. Whether it be ignoring steroids, length of games or instant replay compared to other sports MLB typically takes the longest to adjust from status quo.
Fighting has been ingrained as a part of the culture of
baseball
sports for as long as they have existed.
The act helps to increase the raw energy of the atmosphere at an event – everyone from the players, coaches and crowd can feel the level of emotion rise. Sitting in a stadium/arena when a fight breaks out is an energizing experience.
Situations like this is what makes sports fun. Playoffs are fantastic because they naturally bring out greater level of effort with the stakes being raised.
With a 162 game baseball season or an 82 game NBA/NHL season, you deal with the inevitable lulls that come during productions of that length. When tempers flare a jolt comes to everyone who is encompassed into the event. Watching sports reaches another level of entertainment knowing the players on the field/court/ice are going above and beyond the typical level of engagement. When any degree of fighting occurs it typically leads to these amplified viewing occurrences.
Out of the four major sports baseball is the one that induces the least amount of physical contact. On every single play in a basketball, football or hockey game some sort of physical encounter with your opponent happens. In baseball the possibility only presents itself with being hit by a pitch or a collision around the bases in some fashion.
The NBA and NFL have made determined efforts to make their sports less violent.
Despite the negatives fighting obviously brings, there are also positives. Fights draw press and keep you in today’s 24-hour news cycle. The NBA and NFL decided the publicity that comes with fighting isn’t worth the image it produces, while MLB and the NHL are accepting of the trade off.
If MLB really wanted to contain bean ball wars and fighting they 100% could. They got tired of umpires getting calls wrong and collisions at home plate – instant replay and new rules to limit the amount of contact at home were eventually created.
MLB has made slight changes over the years regarding fights and intentionally throwing at batters, but it’s all bullshit.
Let’s go back to a familiar instance:
From CBS Sports the MLB press release of the suspensions from that brawl:
- D-Backs pitcher Ian Kennedy has received a 10-game suspension for intentionally throwing a pitch in the head area of Zack Greinke of the Dodgers in the bottom of the seventh inning, after a warning had already been issued to both Clubs earlier in the game;
- D-Backs infielder Eric Hinske has received a five-game suspension for leaving the dugout and for his aggressive actions during the incidents;
- Pitcher J.P. Howell and infielder/outfielder Skip Schumaker of the Dodgers have each received two-game suspensions for their aggressive actions during the incidents;
- Dodgers hitting coach Mark McGwire has received a two-game suspension for his conduct during the incidents;
- Dodgers pitcher Ronald Belisario has received a one-game suspension for his aggressive actions during the incidents;
- Dodgers manager Don Mattingly has received a one-game suspension for the actions of his club and for his conduct during the incident;
- D-Backs manager Kirk Gibson has received a one-game suspension for the intentional actions of Kennedy after a warning had been issued.
Look at the absolute mayhem created in that video and read the suspensions again. It’s absolutely laughable, Kennedy missed TWO starts, or more aptly put, 5.7% of his season if he was on track to pitch 35 games. Greinke wasn’t suspended ONE game, not ONE. The highest other punishment was to Hinske, who got five games, and the rest was either one or two games. The lack discipline from the league was almost begging these teams to go right ahead and do it again.
As the season went on the bad blood between the Diamondbacks and Dodgers continued to fester. The eating of bananas in the dugout and jumping in the pool, along with whatever else potentially went on at that moment weren’t the classiest decisions by the Los Angeles organization. The line between having fun and being disrespectful was most definitely crossed.
This led to an explosive October 8th interview with general manager Kevin Towers on the Burns & Gambo Show (a local Arizona radio show):
“I was sitting behind home plate that game and when it showed up on the Diamondvision of stuffing bananas down their throats, I felt like we were a punching bag. Literally, if I would have had a carton of baseballs I would have fired them into the dugout from where I was sitting behind home plate. That’s not who we are as Diamondbacks, that’s now how — I mean, it’s a reflection on Gibby, on myself, on our entire organization. They slapped us around and we took it. You’d think the GM comes down and makes it a point to talk to the staff about it that we need to start protecting our own and doing things differently. Probably a week later Goldy gets dinged, and no retaliation. It’s like wait a minute. Some of them, contractually, it’s tough to move. But I think come spring training, it will be duly noted that it’s going to be an eye for an eye and we’re going to protect one another. If not, if you have options there’s ways to get out out of here and you don’t follow suit or you don’t feel comfortable doing it, you probably don’t belong in a Diamondbacks uniform.”
These thoughts from Towers were not spur of the moment. He’s been doing this a long time and going into a scheduled interview he knows these questions are coming. Towers made the decision to appease a fan base and send a public message to his players instead of keeping the discussion private. He didn’t weigh the repercussions of what saying this on a radio show would do. The story blew up nationally and the D’Backs were officially under the microscope for this type of behavior.
Towers wasn’t punished in any way for these statements by MLB.
Which brings us to the two major incidents that have brought heat on Arizona during the 2014 season.
Over the first two games of a Diamondbacks and Brewers series that started on June 16th at Chase Field, three players from the home team were hit. The key here is the situations. Gerardo Parra was hit with an inside fastball in a 3-3 game with one out in the bottom of the seventh on a 0-0 count.
On June 17th, game two of the series, two Diamondbacks were hit followed by the retaliation to the Brewers Ryan Braun. Leading off the first inning Didi Gregarious was nipped by a breaking ball on an 0-2 count. Leading off the sixth inning with an 0-1 count Chris Owing was hit with a fastball on the very top of his shoulder, nearly nailing him on the head.
In all three instances I’d argue there was no clear intent by the Brewers pitcher to intentionally hit a Diamondbacks batter. It’s still understandable why Arizona would be mad with how things had transpired, particularly the Owings hit by pitch.
During the top of the seventh with two men on and an open base at first reliever Evan Marshall went after Brewers star Ryan Braun. His first pitch went directly behind Braun and the second attempt connected directly with the batter’s rear end.
The most memorable image of the incident was D’Backs manager Kirk Gibson meeting Marshall as he entered the dug out to give him a first bump.
By the way, Marshall wasn’t suspended a single-game by MLB for intentionally throwing at Braun.
During an eight-month period Towers and Gibson, two of the top authority figures in Arizona’s organization, publicly, one through words and the other by actions caught on film, reinforced the philosophy that it’s ok to intentionally hit opposing players.
This wasn’t a back and forth between two opposing players, the leaders of the organization made it clear they were behind these actions.
Unfortunately for the Diamondbacks this didn’t conclude their problem with this specific issue. With their negative perception already reaching unhealthy levels because of the previous incidents, another one was added to the mix on August 2nd.
The night before with no one on base in the bottom of the ninth the Pirates led the D’Backs 9-4. Ernesto Frieri got in on the hands of Paul Goldschmidt with an 0-1 fastball and caught him. The play will most likely cost Goldy the rest of his season.
The next night the Pirates led by a score of 5-1 in the top of the ninth when Arizona reliever Randall Delgado got his revenge for Goldy. Pittsburgh had men on second and third with Andrew McCutchen stepping to the plate. Delgado missed last year’s MVP on the opening pitch with an extremely dangerous knee high fastball. If it landed, who knows what kind of damage could have been done to McCutchen’s knee. Pitch two was an off speed pitch that missed outside and then boom. Delgado drilled the Pirates best player in the back with a 95 MPH fastball on a 2-0 count. Kevin Towers got his “eye for an eye.”
It’s now August 10th and still no suspension has come from MLB’s office for Delgado’s actions.
When I was looking at the YouTube page for the Dodgers-D’Backs brawl embedded above I noticed something. Click the link and observe the page.
On the right hand side are links to other videos to watch. The top four were other MLB fights and so were seven of the first 12. The interesting aspect wasn’t that you could watch fights, any person with a computer can upload videos to YouTube for people to watch. Look at little bit closer to the details and you find out those seven videos were all uploaded on the official MLB YouTube page.
As immature as the actions of Towers and Gibson have been, simply blaming them is taking a micro-view.
Commissioner Bud Selig turned the other way and allowed a culture of performance enhancing drugs to infiltrate the league he controlled.
Based on how he handles violence in his sport, it’s not unfair to work under the assumption that he has chosen to take this path again. Selig has weighed the positives and the negatives of fighting in baseball and decided the excitement and attention teams going at each other brings is worth the negativity generated.
Whether the reasoning for the NBA/NFL increasing their safety precautions are kosher or filled with misdeeds involving race and money, they’ve still taken steps towards protecting their athletes.
As they have before under Selig, baseball continues to be slow to evolve and conform with the necessary steps to improve the long-term standing of what used to be “America’s Game.”
Towers and Gibson should have lead the Diamondbacks organization in a more respectable way, but they’re doing what Major League Baseball allows, and to an extent encourages, with their non-action towards attempting to put a stop to bean ball wars.