“Rougned Odor, starting 2nd baseman for the Texas Rangers, is going to be facing a fine for punching Jose Bautista during the Sunday, May 15th 2016 home game at Globe Life Park in Arlington”.
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Two batters later, the tinderbox exploded when Justin Smoak hit a grounder to third base, Rougned Odor took the relay at second and Bautista slid aggressively through him.
“As far as what happened inside the scrum out on the field, there was a lot of things going on, ” said Texas manager Jeff Banister.
“Bautista got the worst of that exchange”, another announcer added.
The entire exchange can be seen at MLB.com.
It all started after the Jays’ All-Star outfielder Jose Bautista was hit by a pitch.
Bautista’s slide was judged to have violated a new rule created to prevent such plays, so he was given out anyway, then ejected, along with Odor, Blue Jays third baseman Josh Donaldson, and several other coaches and players.
The Rangers won the game, incidentally, 7-6.
This feud between the Rangers and Blue Jays goes back to Bautista’s infamous bat flip in last year’s ALCS.
Ever since, fans and media alike have wondered whether the Rangers would send a message to Bautista the next time the two teams met. This won’t be a surprise to anyone who remembers the epic bat flip from Blue Jay’s Bautista after he hit a go-ahead three-run homer against the Rangers in last year’s playoffs.
It wasn’t the first time Odor’s thrown a punch in a game. That got Toronto pitcher Jesse Chavez and acting manager DeMarco Hale ejected.
Odor called Bautista out for what he believed to be a late slide at second base. “The other 29 teams, if they have an issue with you, they come at you right away”.
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“It was two good teams battling in the playoffs previous year”, Gibbons said. Everybody is going to say, ‘Oh, it was a one-run game.
