Pirates: Will Craig had a good sense of humor about viral fielding mistake

Pittsburgh Pirates rookie Will Craig had a sense of humor when talking about his fielding error against the Chicago Cubs.

This past Thursday, MLB fans were left in a state of shock before bursting out into laughter during a game between the Pittsburgh Pirates and Chicago Cubs. Of course, we are talking about Cubs shortstop Javier Baez’s viral base-running magic created by an error from first baseman Will Craig.

With jokes being thrown at him, Craig showed that he does have a sense of humor. When speaking with the media on Friday, the rookie said that he knows where he will be featured for quite some time — the blooper reel.

“[Thursday] night was tough,” Craig said, via Jeff Hathhorn of WEEI 93.7 FM.  “I replayed that 100 plus times in my head what happened.  I realized there is more to this game than one little mess up. Of course I will be on a blooper real for the rest of my life probably, but I have to keep moving forward with it.

“The best way to do it is to accept it head on.  Don’t deny it, don’t shy away from it. It happened. I can’t let this one day reflect the rest of my season.”

Pirates: Will Craig has sense of humor about massive error vs. Cubs Thursday

You have to admire Craig taking this all in stride. Like many of us, we all have our bad days. As the rookie says, all you can do is move forward.

During that play, the Pirates needed one more out to escape the top of the third inning. Baez hit a ground ball to third baseman Erik Gonzalez, who threw it to Craig to seemingly get the force out. Instead of touching first base, Craig opted to chase down Baez back to home plate. Craig then tossed the ball to catcher Michael Perez to try to prevent a run from scoring. Instead, it led to a series of unfortunate events for the Pirates.

Through 14 games this season since being called up, Craig has recorded a .234 batting average, a .635 OPS, two RBI, four runs scored and 11 hits.

There are still over 100 games remaining on the Pirates’ schedule, so there are opportunities for this error by Craig to be forgotten about. If it is not, Craig is not going to let it bother him.