Juan Soto of the Mets stayed on top of the Baseball Musings Batter Rankings with a two for four with a walk and his 37th home run, the Mets topping the Tigers 12-5. That’s two games in a row where the Mets score in double digits against Detroit, and the fifth time in their last 12 games that the Mets scored at least ten runs.
George Springer of the Blue Jays launched two home runs as he went three for four with a walk to claim second place in a 12-9 win over the Reds. Springer’s game score of 82 was the second highest on the evening, and the game produced the second of three twelve run totals on the night. The third saw the White Sox beat the Twins 12-3, Andrew Benintendi of Chicago going four for five with two home runs and five RBI for a game score of 87, the highest on the day.
Bobby Witt Jr. of the Royals ranks third after collecting a triple and a walk in a 5-1 Angels win. Witt now totals 33 triples for his career, averaging just over eight a season.
Brice Turang of the Brewers takes fourth place. The Brewers needed a day off, and the Phillies wanted to play on Labor Day, so there was an unusual break in the middle of the series. Four Brewers batters now rank in the top ten.
The recovering Corey Seager of the Rangers ranks fifth and did not play. Rafael Devers of the Giants ranks sixth and caused some controversy in Colorado when he spent too much time admiring a home run. Here is Freeland on the grandstanding:
“I found it extremely disrespectful to show me up like that in the first inning — after hitting the home run, standing there watching it, taking your sweet time getting down to first base. I’ve been in this league for quite some time. I know he has as well. I just find that extremely disrespectful and felt that I needed to let him know about that.
“Given the circumstances, it’s the first inning and you want to try and play a cool head. At the same time, being disrespected like that, I felt there was a need to say something and let him know, ‘You disrespected me. You showed me up and I don’t respect you doing that, coming into my ballpark and doing that.’”
MLB.com
This will always be the problem with allowing celebrations. Professional athletes are hyper competitive; it’s what allows them to become professional athletes. Part of that is loathing losing. So etiquette develops* (called sportsmanship) to prevent these men from killing each other. In recent years that etiquette became looser, but there is still a limit, and Devers seemed to pass it last night.
*Something similar happens in some large cities. People adopt extreme politeness, otherwise all the jostling and bumping would result in two much verbal abuse and violence.
