Verlander’s No No-Hitter
It was a pitching duel between Justin Verlander of the Detroit Tigers and the Los Angeles Angels with Jared Weaver. In the bottom of the third inning the Tigers’ Magglio Ordoñez hit a ball off of Weaver that was borderline fair/foul as it sailed into the outfield. Ordoñez stood in the batter’s box watching the ball to see on which side of the foul pole it would curve. With the ball eventually sailing to the right of the pole for a home run, Weaver took this as Ordoñez admiring the hit and the two began to share some words. In the bottom of the seventh, Carlos Guillen decided to get back at Weaver for calling out the teammate of the former so when Guillen hit a home run he stood there to admire it and then skipped off to first base. Understandably, this ticked Weaver off. As a result, the next hitter, Alex Avila, got a fastball high and inside that caused Avila to duck. Weaver was ejected and the game continued.
For the other side, Verlander was pitching a no-hitter into the bottom of the eighth. With no outs, no men on, and down 3-0, the Angels’ Eric Aybar came up to the plate and laid a bunt down. Verlander went to field the ball and threw it passed the first baseman as Aybar reached the base and because of the poor throw, Aybar was able to advance to second. The play was ruled an error, so the no-hitter was still on, but later in the inning Verlander lost his no-hitter and Aybar eventually scored. This brought up the debate about yet another one of baseball’s unwritten rules: A player does not bunt to end a no-hitter.
Defending Aybar’s Controversial Bunt
People are yelling and screaming at the Angels and Aybar for calling this bunt. Even though it did not directly end Verlander’s no-hitter, it was the intent that everybody is yelling about. Many people seem to want to rip off the head’s of both Aybar and skipper Mike Scioscia but I believe that Aybar did nothing wrong.
The Angels were two games behind the Texas Rangers in the AL West with playoff implications on the line at the start of this game. The Tigers were up 3-0 at the time of the bunt, still a very manageable game. Aybar should not be thinking that he has to swing in order to break the no-hitter properly. He should be going up to the plate thinking that he needs to get on base in order to get his team back in this game and move a game closer to the Rangers in the standings. Aybar wants to get on base in order to get a run, by any means necessary, and that is how it should be. The game was still very much in reach; in fact the Angels scored two that inning but ended up losing 3-2. No player on that Angels’ team wants to be on the wrong side of the no-hitter so why should they keep their bat on their shoulder? If these guys are true competitors then they should want to do anything to win the game. If Verlander is truly the great pitcher that we all know he is, he should not have to ask for less than the opposing team’s best in order get a no-hitter. The Angels’ players should not put appeasing the Tigers in front of getting a win. The only situation I would have somewhat of a problem with the bunt would be if it was something like an 8-0 game with the Angels nowhere near a playoff appearance. If Verlander threw a 0-2 pitch down the middle of the plate should we expect Aybar to let it go in order to strike out and maintain the no-hitter? NO! The day opposing teams limit themselves in a close game in order to appeal to the opposing team is a sad day in sports.
In addition, these teams had bad blood between them during the game with home run debacles, the pitch to the head, and the ejection. Aybar’s pitcher had been shown up by the Tigers and nobody should expect the Angels to take that lying down. Now, Aybar is not a pitcher and thus he cannot throw at a Tiger hitter. Aybar did the hitter’s equivalent to a retaliatory pitch. If Guillen is going to stand and admire a home run off Weaver, then Aybar is going to bunt to prevent a no-hitter.
No matter how I see it, Aybar and the Angels did nothing wrong in laying down a bunt to try and stop a no-hitter. These guys are paid millions upon millions of dollars to give their best every game. Anything less, especially in order to appease their opponents, is disgusting and disgraceful. If he was doing this to stand up for the ejected Weaver then good for Aybar because that shows how good of a teammate he is and a guy like that is going to be welcomed by teammates in any locker room because it shows that he has their backs when they need it.
"Aybar did the hitter’s equivalent to a retaliatory pitch."
ReplyDeleteSo then shouldn't Aybar have been ejected? Yes I understand what you're trying to argue but I think you've gone a bit too far. I think there's a big difference between being "bush league" and "doing something wrong."