In Tuesday night’s game against Texas, A.J. Burnett threw a pitch directly at the head of the Rangers’ best hitter. This came right after opposing pitcher Vicente Padilla plunked Mark Teixeira for the second time in the game.
After Burnett’s "errant” pitch, he and both benches were warned by home-plate umpire Doug Eddings. Despite no further action, Major League Baseball suspended Burnett for six games and fined, while Padilla was just fined.
I quickly polled my twitter followers asking if Burnett deserved the suspension, and here’s what they said:
- shonniedkny1973: no he didnt he didnt hit no one but our guy got hit twice
- charkat: Not when Padilla doesn't get suspended at all.
- keithmarder: No way on the 6-game suspension. He didn't even hit anyone
- HTBP: no, but i say that from a pitcher's standpoint, they've taken the power out of the pitcher's hand, i don't agree with it
- YankeeMeginPHL: ABSOLUTELY NOT. But MLB has tightened up. What's get me is that Padilla was just fined an undisclosed amount.
- gcf123: deserve no but it is consistent with the beckett suspension
- jaydestro: deserve? probably not but watson is being consistent with his suspensions.
- lbwvu: I can't believe Burnett got suspended! He didn't even hit the guy! Unreal.
My only quarrel with this is the way Eddings handled the game. If he was aware of the history between Padilla and Teixeira, Padilla should have been warned after hitting him the first time. Burnett deserved to be thrown out of the game for what he did, but only if Padilla gets warned earlier. What’s the purpose of warning Burnett if he’s going to be suspended?
Note: I just heard Yankees beat writer Mark Feinsand on the radio say that he wasn’t surprised that Burnett got suspended, but was surprised that Padilla only was fined.
Anyways, since Burnett has appealed, he will not miss his start until he loses or drops the appeal.
