Is Willson Contreras a dirty player for cup-checking Max Muncy?

Chicago Cubs catcher Willson Contreras was caught with his hand in the cookie jar on Sunday Night Baseball. Thankfully, Max Muncy wasn’t injured.

With Muncy up to bat against the Cubs on Sunday’s ESPN showcase, Contreras appeared to grab him in a delicate spot. The Dodgers second baseman wasn’t wearing protection in that area, and thus it took him some time to recover.

Contreras would argue he was reaching for the ball, but instead he received the plural form of that word. All jokes aside, was Willson’s act intentional?

The veteran catcher doesn’t have a history of things like this — he’s not MLB’s Grayson Allen. But given the replay it’s tough to see what Contreras was going for.

Cubs: Willson Contreras grabs Max Muncy in delicate area

It’s tough to believe that if Contreras had any vendetta against Muncy, he would go below the belt. Contreras, a player who has been hit by more pitches than most in professional baseball the last few years, surely wants to play the game the right way to avoid that same fate in the future.

Muncy, meanwhile, didn’t need an injury to a delicate area added to his early-season struggles. Through 66 at-bats, Muncy was hitting far under .200 with very little positivity in site. Despite his low batting average, Muncy is getting on base at a decent clip, and has a respectable OPS.

In fact, he wants the Dodgers scoreboard operator to reflect just that when showing his season statistics.

“I like when the scoreboards do the OPS instead of batting averages. That looks much nicer. It doesn’t hurt as bad because I still get on base. Yeah, when you see the OPS it’s a little bit nicer,” Muncy said.

Perhaps there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, after all.