To: BluesDuke
I agree. But in Clemens case, The Bruised Ego has much to do with it....
IF a Pitcher wants to brush a guy back, I ahve no problem with that, that's Baseball, but going upstairs, should also merit suspension, If you don't have the control to Plunk someone without possibly killing them, don't.
It was too Sweet, to see Estes and Piazza, Both take Clemens out of the park on Saturday, and after Being in the Batters box, He didn't look too much look a guy that had won his last (7 of 8 ?) starts...Even negelecting to cover Home plate with a man on second and the catcher coming upfield....( I see guys cover home in Softball for crying out loud....)
9 posted on
06/17/2002 5:21:08 AM PDT by
hobbes1
To: hobbes1
I agree. But in Clemens case, The Bruised Ego has much to do with it....
It did when it came to his original coning of Piazza back in 2000. (Piazza usually hits Clemens the way Mo Vaughn, it turns out, hits David Wells - like a personal BP pitcher.)
IF a Pitcher wants to brush a guy back, I ahve no problem with that, that's Baseball, but going upstairs, should also merit suspension, If you don't have the control to Plunk someone without possibly killing them, don't.
Well, the idea of going up and in is to knock the guy on his ass, not decapitate him. But I would favour suspension in two circumstances:
1) If the pitcher knocks down the next guy in the lineup after he's had a home run hit off him; and,
2) If the pitcher knocks down the guy who hit the homer off him. Brush a guy off the plate if you must; the strike zone (no matter the umpires' manipulations and contortions) doesn't begin in the middle of the plate and end on the outer black, the pitcher is entitled to work the entire zone. Brush a guy back or knock him on his ass if one of your teammates got flipped. But knock a guy down because your ego was taken yard, and you ought to miss at least two starts or (if you're a relief pitcher) one week.
It was too Sweet, to see Estes and Piazza, Both take Clemens out of the park on Saturday, and after Being in the Batters box, He didn't look too much look a guy that had won his last (7 of 8 ?) starts...Even negelecting to cover Home plate with a man on second and the catcher coming upfield....( I see guys cover home in Softball for crying out loud....)
I can't really be hard on Clemens on the play at first (he himself said it should have been him covering home), because some clubs work the play as either the first baseman or the third baseman covering the plate on the play (Torre himself suggested that if the bunt's to the first base side, it should have been Giambi coming down the line who covered the plate), usually to protect the pitcher.
But I will say that all the bloodthirsties looking to see Clemens get coned had better be off to see their shrinks. The right time for the Mets to drill a hole in Clemens's head or side was supposed to have been in the game where he coned Piazza; or, regarding the World Series shish-kebab attempt, you get the Yankee DH and the hottest bat in the Yankee lineup in that game - when the Mets failed both times (ok, so Glendon Rusch plunked Tino Martinez in the Piazza-cone game...not quite enough when Clemens is still in the game, you get the man who coned your boy if he has to hit in the game or you get the DH and the hot bat and Martinez was neither at the time). Or, if it's in the Mets' park and the Yankees get cute and pinch hit for Clemens, send his pinch hitter on his ass.
Estes did the right thing by throwing right behind his thighs. Since it's two years removed and the Mets wussied the first time, but you still need to send the man a message, that is the way you do it. He sent the message and didn't cost his team a potential run - I mean, it was one out, bases empty, and Alfonso Soriano on deck, and even if Clemens isn't exactly a gazelle on the bases (as a baserunner he's a future Hall of Fame pitcher), you still have to ask whether you'd rather pitch to Soriano with one on and one out or nobody on and two out. I know how I'd rather be pitching to Soriano, even if he was in a bit of a slump - you don't want to give one of the Yankees' best hitters an excuse to bust out of it by giving him a situation to push a runner into scoring position or even send him home on an extra base hit. (You think I study Casey Stengel just because the Ol' Perfesser was a funny guy?)
Estes probably also had to know that one pitch buzzing Clemens anywhere would bring out the warning to both sides, meaning he took the weapon out of The Rocket's hot little hand...and the result was there for one and all to see: Estes goes yard for two. Piazza goes yard solo. Mets bury the Yankees with an 8-0 shutout. Momentum: Mets. They come back on the Yankees Sunday night, down 2-0, put men on the corners against David Wells pitching a good game and up comes Mo Vaughn, who beats up on Wells even better than Piazza does on Clemens (if all Vaughn had to face was Wells, he'd bust every slugging record in the book and hit .400 a season for about four seasons), and bing! Vaughn goes yard and that's the game. So anyone who still thinks Estes didn't do his duty on Saturday, think again. And again. And the next time the Mets face Clemens and he dusts or dots a Met, get him immediately - if it's in Yankee Stadium in a couple of weekends, get that Yankee DH and the hottest hitter in the Yankee lineup at the time at the next available opportunity. That's what the Seaver-Koosman-Hodges Mets - the 1969 Miracle Mets - would have done and did do when needed. That's why they call such things the wisdom of our ancestors.
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