Any Boston fan, unless you are living under a rock, is aware that there was quite a bit of drama in the last series with the Orioles. To recap for those under said rock: Manny Machado slid late and hard into second base during the Friday night game. Pedroia had the leave the game due to getting spiked in the knee. He got an MRI on Monday and is day to day. As of today, he still hasn’t made his way back into the lineup. Many believe Machado’s slide was dirty and the Sox would retaliate. Nothing happened on Saturday. That probably had more to do with the knuckleballer being on the mound than anything else. On Sunday the drama picked right back up. In the 8th inning, Matt Barnes threw at Manny Machado. He threw up and around his head. The ball just barely missed Manny and actually hit his bat. Barnes was ejected. Manny and Pedroia had an exchange on the field. Barnes denied he meant to throw at his head. Pedroia said it was mishandled and apologized to Manny and the O’s.
Cut to Monday and MLB announces that they have suspended Matt Barnes for 4 games. He appealed his suspension. It was just announced a little bit ago that Barnes has dropped his appeal. He’ll start serving his suspension tonight.
So, there are a lot of thoughts about this. Here are mine.
I think the hard slide that hurt Pedroia was incredibly unfortunate, but I don’t believe it was intentional by Machado. I’ve rewatched his slide a bunch of times over. As soon as Machado sees that Pedey is hurt, he moved to break his fall and then puts his hand on his back to check on him. I know Machado has a history of being a hot head and sometimes kind of a jerk. However, he also has a friendship and seemingly a lot of respect for Pedroia. I also looked at the language for the new slide rule since 2016. While it sucks that Pedroia got hurt, I don’t see in the verbage of the rule that Machado broke it. He slid late, but it was not illegal. To be illegal you need to slide after you get to the bag. You also have to not slide in the direction of the base, but instead in the direction of the defender out of the basepath. Manny slide through the bag, but he didn’t lose contact with the bag until he came off to break Pedey’s fall. He had his spikes up, however there is no language about spikes. Did he do it on purpose? Only Machado knows, but I don’t think he did.
Then we move to Sunday. I’m going to openly admit that I hate the unwritten rule that in order to stand up for a defender, you are supposed to plunk someone. I think it’s barbaric. I know I am in the minority here. I knew Machado would get hit sooner or later. The Sox had a comfortable lead on Sunday, so that was the day. Enter Matt Barnes into the drama. Barnes pitched the 8th inning and when Machado came into the box, he threw a ball up and inside right by his head. It luckily hit his bat and not his head. Barnes was ejected. Pedroia ended up saying something along the lines of “it’s not me, it’s them” to Machado. Pedroia, Barnes and Machado all made statements after the game.
During the game, I believed strongly that Barnes was head hunting. I was pretty pissed. Retaliate, but don’t go throwing at someone’s head. Not cool. However, Barnes won me over with his post game comments. He said that he didn’t intend to throw at Manny’s head. He said that there are lines you don’t cross and that is one of them. He said he knows how it looked and for that, he was sorry. He gets why they are pissed. I think Barnes meant to hit Manny, but his location was off and instead of plunking him between the numbers, the ball floated up by his head. I never expected Barnes to admit he was head hunting, but his genuineness in his comments just rang true to me. He seemed genuinely sorry for what happened and how it all unfolded.
On Monday they announced that Barnes was suspended 4 games for throwing at Machado. Barnes said he was appealing it. I expected it to be dropped down to 3 games and be done with it. I was surprised to hear that he dropped his suspension and is starting to serve it out tonight. However, I think that is a super smart move. While I don’t believe that Barnes meant to throw at Manny’s head, it’s still what happened. Barnes needs to be held accountable for that. A message needs to be sent. Additionally, I think it is a super smart move of Barnes to have this suspension done and served before the Orioles came back to town next Monday. I think that it helps to put this all behind both teams.
I hope both teams move on. I respect both Pedroia and Barnes for how they handled this. I personally don’t think that Pedroia was a bad teammate or threw Barnes under the bus. He was trying to squash something into turning into a full blown war. I’m also a strong believer that telling the truth has value. Pedroia couldn’t stand by a teammate throwing at someone’s head, intentional or not. I think that shows that he is a leader of this club. He will stand behind his club, but he’ll also say when something isn’t right. He has all my respect.
I do hope that this is over. If not, I am pretty sure Pedroia will be the guy that gets plunked next (if he’s back in the lineup by then). I hope both Pedroia and Machado send a strong message to their ballclubs that we all need to move on.
Play Ball….well, not you Matt Barnes. Not for 4 more days.
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