Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
May 28, 2008
Strange Ejection

Here's more on the Julio Lugo ejection in Tuesday night's game:

Lugo had been shouting "Check! Check!" from his shortstop position, indicating he wanted help from Hernandez on the pitch. After Hernandez ruled that Ibanez had held up, Lugo said the umpire was staring at him. When Lugo asked what he was staring at, Hernandez ejected him.

Lugo raced over to Hernandez for an explanation and the umpire several times turned away from the infielder, ignoring his question. Francona raced out to restrain Lugo and, not long after, got himself ejected, too.

"I didn't say nothing else," maintained Lugo after the game, a 4-3 Sox loss, had ended. "There's nothing else I can say. I don't know -- I don't understand. I just wanted to know why he threw me out."

Added an exasperated Francona: "I wouldn't know where to begin. I just wanted to get Lugo out of there and move on with the game."

The story goes on to explain that Lugo and Hernandez have a history, and Lugo obviously doesn't like Hernandez. If Lugo didn't utter an expletive when asking the question, Hernandez shouldn't have tossed him. You could see him telling Francona that Lugo argued the pitch call, which is an automatic ejection.


Posted by David Pinto at 10:47 AM | Umpires | TrackBack (0)
Comments

Two things:

1. Lugo should keep his mouth shut until his play improves. He's being replaced by Alex Cora for late inning defense and is an adventure at the plate.

2. Most of the MLB has an issue/history with Angel Hernandez, commonly regarded as the worst working umpire.

Posted by: Joe in Philly at May 28, 2008 11:22 AM

Unlike the fiasco that goes on in the NBA the officials should not become the center factor of play. You can see what a mess it is in the NBA and we sure don't want it to be that way in baseball.

Posted by: emains at May 28, 2008 01:33 PM

Was this Angel Hernandez? Yea, conversation over. He has zero credibility and should not be umpiring games.

Posted by: John Peterson at May 28, 2008 02:31 PM

The rules say that only a manager or a catcher can request an appeal on a check swing. I agree with Joe in Philly that Angel Hernandez is not held in high regard, and I also think that an immediate ejection was a bit much (unless there's more to the story that Lugo didn't mention). But if I was an umpire, that sort of thing may get under my skin too.

Posted by: Kanka at May 28, 2008 02:37 PM

MLB should investigate this incident--if they determine that Lugo is telling the truth, Hernandez should be fired instantly to make an example of him. There's no room for that sort of this sort of thing in pro sports.

Posted by: M. Scott Eiland at May 28, 2008 02:59 PM

Lugo has the bad combination of both sucking and being a jerk off at the same time.

Posted by: Bandit at May 29, 2008 12:12 PM
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