Before the first pitch had even been thrown to Carlos Gomez, last night, fans should have known something was up. As he stepped into the batter’s box, Gomez and Atlanta Braves catcher Brian McCann exchanged words – words you could were not friendly.
Gomez has had some troubles with Paul Maholm over his career, and those troubles got magnified this season. In 2010, Gomez go hit by Maholm. Then, on June 23rd of this season, Gomez hit a Paul Maholm pitch out of the park, and was hit on the next pitch he saw in his left knee.
Coming into the batter’s box, you could tell Gomez had those incidents on his mind. While there’s no way to know what was said before the plate appearance, it is fairly easy to tell that the feelings were not positive. McCann and Gomez were clearly on opposing teams, and clearly had a distaste for the other. On the first pitch of the at bat, Gomez took a ferocious hack, but came up with nothing. After stepping out, and back in, Gomez got set for the next pitch.
What happened next, was unbelievable. Gomez took Maholm’s 0-1 change-up deep to left-center field, and deposited it into the fifth row. Gomez took a long time to admire his hit, which Braves catcher Brian McCann didn’t take too kindly to. From listening to the replay, and the telecasts, to the game, it becomes increasingly evident that McCann yelled something inappropriate at Gomez about running the bases – something Gomez didn’t enjoy.
Gomez not only took his time to first (he didn’t start running until he was over half way down the line), but he then proceeded to have some verbal exchanges with Freddie Freeman and Paul Maholm. By the time Gomez had taken his sweet time to get the home, McCann was fed up with it and wouldn’t let Gomez get to the plate. Both players being extremely heated at the time led to benches clearing, and ultimately ejections of Freeman and Gomez, fines for Freeman and McCann, and suspensions for Gomez and Reed Johnson (who had attacked Gomez in the bench clearing action).
While Gomez’ actions seem very unnecessary, I want to focus in on what McCann had to do in this whole dilemma. From before the very first pitch of the at-bat, to the time the brawl happened, McCann had his part well mapped out.
As mentioned before, Gomez and McCann shared some words before the first pitch – which seem have been ignited by the Braves’ catcher. Then, as Gomez enjoyed his home run, McCann added some fuel to the fire by yelling at Gomez, and by the time Gomez got to home, McCann had made sure the situation had blown up.
While it’s easy to make Gomez the bad guy here, for watching his home run and instigating the Braves, McCann possibly played the most vital role in it all. Had McCann let Gomez cross home plate, and allowed the game resume like normal, Gomez would have been the bad guy. No fight would have happened, no ejections would have been made, and a normal game would have been played after a bad move made by Gomez.
Unfortunately, McCann wasn’t pleased with that, and had to add to the drama. It seemed that from the time Gomez walked out of the batter’s box, McCann was intent on making an explosion of the ordeal. While this one incident seems isolated, we don’t even have to look back a full month to see the last time McCann started an unnecessary bench-clearing pause.
When Jose Fernandez took the Braves deep for his first career home run, he, too, enjoyed his hit. As he rounded third base he spit on it, and McCann didn’t find that too pleasing. He had some words for Fernandez when he got to home. Chris Johnson usually gets the blame for this incident, as he came charging in from third to hide behind the umpire, but what largely goes unnoticed is that the umpire had already stepped in on the McCann/Fernandez interaction, and the benches were already in the process of clearing.
The most ironic part of both times McCann has instigated something is that it’s been for actions his team does as well – admiring home runs. He seems to forget the times that Upton flips the bat and walks to first base, or the time Gattis admired his bomb against the Phillies. All of the times Atlanta’s shown another team up seem to become nonexistent when other players do it to the Braves. McCann has one of the most pompous players on his team, in Justin Upton, yet you never hear of McCann telling him to stop, or getting in his face.
In two weeks McCann has started two bench clearing game pauses, in an attempt to make players do what his team will not – respect. Between both instances McCann has gotten off with one fine, that’s it. While several punishments were handed out after last night’s action, McCann got little more than a slap on the wrist despite being the main instigator to the “brawl”. Maybe after these actions, teams will start to respect the Braves, maybe people will finally understand why the Braves can admire their home runs but other teams cannot, or maybe teams will learn to push McCann’s buttons just a little bit more.
Hopefully, though, the MLB learn to recognize McCann as a troublemaker – and punish him for what he does.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
