One of MLB’s rising stars hit a grand slam. He was chastised for ignoring the ‘unwritten rules’
Fernando Tatis Jr. is one of the most dynamic young players in baseball. The 21-year-old Padres shortstop leads the majors in home runs (11), RBIs (28), runs (22), and total bases (69) through 23 games and 107 plate appearances.
He hit his 10th and 11th home runs Monday in a 14-4 win over the Rangers, the latter of which was a grand slam for the Padres’ final runs of the game. Pretty good, right?
The issue? Rangers manager Chris Woodward — and many others throughout the league — didn’t take kindly to the fact that Tatis swung on a 3-and-0 pitch with the bases loaded when the Padres were already up, 10-3, in the eighth inning.
“I didn’t like it, personally,” Woodward told reporters after the game. “But, like I said, the norms are being challenged on a daily basis. So just because I don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s not right. I don’t think we liked it as a group.”
Padres manager Jayce Tingler said Tatis missed a take sign, which is often given when a batter is up 3-and-0 in the count regardless of the score. Tingler chalked up the missed sign to Tatis’s inexperience.
“He’s young, a free spirit, and focused and all those things,” Tingler said. “That’s the last thing that we’ll ever take away. It’s a learning opportunity and that’s it. He’ll grow from it.”
Tatis apologized after the game.
“I’ve been in this game since I was a kid,” he said. “I know a lot of unwritten rules. I was kind of lost on this.
“Those experiences, you have to learn. Probably next time, I’ll take a pitch.”
Baseball’s youngest players are challenging the game’s long-established norms, as Woodward noted. Last year, White Sox star Tim Anderson had no qualms about flipping his bat after a home run, which prompted a debate of its own. There remains a divide between the old guard and the game’s up-and-coming stars about baseball conventions.
On social media, a number of players took the opposite opinion of Woodward and Tingler: Tatis, they said, should be rewarded for swinging. The onus is on the pitcher.
Red Sox starter Collin McHugh, who opted out of the 2020 season, said swinging “in a 3-0 count should not be against any rules, no matter the score.”
“The guys who will never ‘give you a pitch’ at the plate are the toughest [at bats],” he wrote.
The Red Sox’ Eduardo Rodriguez, who is out for the season after suffering from myocarditis after a bout with COVID-19, agreed.
“You just have to pitch better if you don’t want that to happen,” he wrote.
The only thing Reds pitcher Trevor Bauer took issue with was the fact that Tatis apologized.
“Keep bringing energy and flash to baseball and making it fun,” he wrote.
But perhaps the best endorsement was from Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson, who hit 563 career home runs.
“It ain’t easy to hit HRs,” he said on Twitter. “Keep bringing the energy you have to the game, we need players like you.”
Tatis finished 2 for 5 with 7 RBIs. That’s almost the same batting line, with one fewer RBI, that his father, Fernando Sr., had when he hit two grand slams in the same inning on April 23, 1999. Fernando Jr. was only three months old.
Material from the Associated Press was used in this report.
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