Retaliation

Last Tuesday, the matchup between Vicente Padilla of the Texas Rangers and A.J. Burnett of the New York Yankees got nasty in the fourth inning. Padilla, for the second time in the game, drilled Mark Teixeira with a pitch. After slamming his bat to the ground and staring down Padilla, Teixeira went on to break up a potential double-play ball later in the inning with a hard—albeit clean—slide into second base, leveling Texas shortstop El Adrus. Next inning, flamethrower A.J. Burnett threw over the head of Texas’s Nelson Cruz, in an apparent act of retaliation. It should be noted that Padilla (who does not throw in the mid-to-high nineties) first just barely grazed Teixeira’s shoulder, then hit him in the butt the next at-bat.

The fallout from this: Burnett suspended 6 games for missing Nelson Cruz with one pitch, while Padilla is facing a fine of an undisclosed amount for plunking Teixeira twice. Despite complaints that Burnett was unfairly punished, I think MLB’s reaction is just. If a pitcher throws at someone between the waist and shoulders, like Padilla did, it sends a message to the other team, but doesn’t really put the opposing batter in lots of danger, and therefore doesn’t deserve a profound penalty. But when a Burnett-esque hurler whizzes one by your head, things can get a little iffy. That’s why Burnett’s punishment is more severe than Padilla’s.

Even though I think the final verdicts were appropriate, home plate umpire Doug Eddings could have handled the on-field situation more professionally. Padilla hits the Yankees star slugger in consecutive at-bats, and Eddings issues no warnings…even after Teixeira had some choice words for the Rangers’ pitcher, and came close to charging the mound? Eddings ought to have anticipated some sort of retaliation on behalf of the Yankees, and should have taken control of the game before it got out of hand. Until warnings are issued by the home plate umpire, pitchers basically have a free pass to do whatever they want, as a warning almost always preludes any ejections.