It’s important to remember, though, that pitchers do not naturally throw that far inside, and altering the target that much can lead to a miss, and in that case, what if he had missed high instead of off to the side?
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The Dodgers’ Chase Utley powered two homeruns over the wall, including a whopping grand slam that really just seem to slam the Dodgers’ victory down the throats of the New York Mets.
Lasers in the outfield: The Mets aren’t happy with the way the Dodgers tried to make their mark in NY this weekend.
Rubin reported, “Wright was examined by a team doctor Saturday after complaining of neck discomfort”. What he did get was ejected in the top of the third inning.
So, now that Utley has gotten the better of Mets pitching and Syndergaard sent the objective pitch, this thing is over, right?
“I think a loud, energizing environment gets the best out of you”. Utley eventually struck out against Mets reliever Logan Verrett, but he rebounded to hit a solo home run in the sixth inning and a grand slam in the seventh. “He’s that kind of a player”. It appeared to be an attempt to exact revenge for the National League Division Series last October when former Mets shortstop Ruben Tejada suffered a broken leg after a hard slide into second base by Utley. The Mets – and their fans – were incensed by the aggressive slide, which led to a change in baseball rules this season created to protect infielders in what some call the Utley Rule.
The Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Mets play a rubber game Sunday night on ESPN2. “But more times than not lately, I’ve been getting them and I’ve been missing them”, he said (via Dave Sessions of MLB.com). With Utley at the plate and one out, no one on and no score, Syndergaard fired his first pitch of the at-bat-a 99-mph four-seam fastball-directly behind the second baseman’s back. “I disagreed with it. …” Syndergaard would have had to be close to flawless if the Mets were going to win this one. “There was a time when, in this game, where you had a shot, and nothing happened”. “The ball went to the backstop”. “So that was kind of my argument”.
Asked if he thought the pitch was intentional, Utley responded, “Possibly, but I understand it”.
A sellout crowd that turned out to watch a pregame ceremony honoring the 1986 World Series champion Mets – who got into four bench-clearing fights during their title season – gave Syndergaard and Collins standing ovations as they exited before showering Hamari with boos.
After the game, umpire crew chief Tom Hallion told a pool reporter that no warnings had been issued to the teams before the series and that the ejection by plate umpire Art Hamari was unrelated to the fallout from last year’s incident. And if it was, we can either warn or eject. “And with what happened in that situation, we felt the ejection was warranted”.
“Every team has different priorities and there have been various teams that have asked to make a mark on our field and we’ve been OK with it”, Roberts said. We can’t think, well, this guy did this or did that in Game 6 of whatever.
The Mets take the field on Sunday at 8pm in the rubber game of the Dodger series with Bartolo Colon on the mound.
Collins said he had never before seen a pitcher get ejected without a warning. Both Collins and Syndergaard could be suspended for their actions.
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Verrett retired seven of the next eight batters he faced before Utley homered on the first pitch of the sixth.
