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Thursday, June 16, 2005

My thoughts on Tuesday's Incident

I decided wait until the series was over before giving my opinion on the pine tar/bench clearing near brawl that happened. If you want other opinions, you can find that here, here, here, here, here, and here, plus many others that I haven't mentioned. There are also several comments on the issue in many of the posts...many of them Nationals fans who decided to troll a bit.
  • Donnelly cheated, pure and simple. He gets no sympathy, it doesn't matter why or how many other people did it...he cheated and was caught. He will hopefully take his suspension like a man.
  • Frank Robinson had every right to check out Donnelly's glove.
  • Scioscia had every right to check the check the equipment of every Nationals player and he was being kind in letting Robinson know this. Robinson should have expected retaliation in this sort of instance. As a matter of fact, I would bet that he made sure none of his guys brought anything with them into the games this series (whether or not they do normally).
  • Robinson should be respected for what he did as a player, but giving him respect as a manager? Please...he has never been very effective and the only reason he is managing right now is because the MLB wanted to put someone in the position that was relatively cheap and could make it look like they cared about the franchise.
  • Guillen was reacting like a 2-year old when the benches cleared. That said, it was not hard to predict he would hit a home run in his next at bat...this is what he does...he gets pissed off for some perceived lack of respect and then he goes on a hitting tear.
  • It is now obvious Robinson was not allowing Guillen to answer questions about the Angels because he did not want to give the Angels any fuel for the fire.
  • Robinson is a prick. Not coming out to turn in the lineup cards at the beginning of the next game is petty. Also, the ESPN2 announcers (one was Joe Morgan, who I know the blogosphere just loves) kept calling Robinson "old school." I bring this up only because they said it so many times and never said Scioscia was once...despite the fact that ESPN announcers (including Joe Morgan) absolutely love to call Scioscia "old school." Can there only be one "old school" manager per game?
  • Guillen is no longer a tragic character...a hero that just can't quite keep his temper in check. Pure and simple, the guy is a complete asshole. They should have brought Donnelly in to peg Guillen in the 9th in Wednesday's game. Next time the Angels face him, they had better hit him.
  • The only interesting question left in the whole saga, I think, is whether or not Guillen actually tipped the Nationals off to Donnelly having pine tar on his glove. If he did, I expect the Angels to retaliate in a big way the next time they can (more so than my demand that they bean him).

Comments:


Scioscia had every right to check the check the equipment of every Nationals player and he was being kind in letting Robinson know this. Robinson should have expected retaliation in this sort of instance.

I don't think I agree with this. Sure, Scioscia had the "right" to ask for all the Nationals' equipment to be checked, but a better manager would have put this behind him as quickly as possible and moved on. I don't know Scioscia like you Angels' fans do, but I think he has a tendency to let things get under his skin. He's vulnerable to being distracted and that sort of thing will filter through to the rest of the team.

I've seen these kinds of incidents in many different sporting situations. A player, a coach, a scout notices something about a future opponent and stores the data for use at an opportune time.

Scioscia should have bitten his tongue and encouraged the team to just shake it off. Instead he vows that he's "going to get you" to Robinson and then goes all petty. Better to stay cool - for his sake and, more importantly, his team's sake.

posted by Blogger Eagle @ 1:54 AM
Robinson should be respected for what he did as a player, but giving him respect as a manager? Please...he has never been very effective and the only reason he is managing right now is because the MLB wanted to put someone in the position that was relatively cheap and could make it look like they cared about the franchise.

Funny thing to say right now. He's manager of the year in the NL as of right now. He's got a team with virtually no hitting and only a mediocre staff in first place.

And, it could be argued that he managed his way to two wins in Anaheim by getting under Mike Scioscia's skin.

posted by Blogger Eagle @ 1:57 AM
It depends largely on the manager and the team as to whether challenging the other team's rulebreakers is a good thing or not. Certainly some teams will think their manager has gone off the deep end and has become petty, while others will think that he is sticking up for them. Scioscia actually has an amazing ability to let things NOT get under his skin and so the fact taht this did may have been what affected the team.

As far as showing respect to Robinson goes for his managerialabilities...managers of the year are not won because of the first third of the season. The Nationals need to do this over a full season in order to have a shot. They happen to currently be in a scorching spell right now. If the Nationals had lost 5 in a row before that game he wouldn't be considered "manager of the year" material at that moment, but I still think that people who say "Robinson should be shown respect because he is a Hall of Famer" is an idiotic argument for discussing his managerial decisions. Yes, he is having success right now as a manager, but I will wait and see before declaring him another Jack McKeown.

posted by Blogger Unknown @ 8:37 AM
I pretty much agree with eveything you say here, Josh. Now bring on the trolls!

posted by Blogger Richard @ 10:57 AM
I actually think Robinson did a pretty good job with Montreal last year too.

posted by Blogger Eagle @ 1:07 PM
Leaving win/loss records and expectations aside, any manager who allows his staff ace to throw 150 pitches in a single game (and an average of 117 a game) is an idiot. He’s going to destroy that entire staff by season’s end.

posted by Blogger Richard @ 1:25 PM
Not that I put much credence on awards voted on by writers (Mo Vaughn over Belle in 1995 MVP voting???), but Frank did win a couple Manager of the Year awards (with SF and CLE). Separately, Frank has always been a jerk. This is not something new to him. I can remember running into him in the 80's and I just said "hey Frank welcome back to town" or something equally innocuous. He just gave me a F-off look and walked away. I'm not an autograph seeker and was just saying hi and that was enough to piss him off.

posted by Blogger LargeBill @ 9:05 AM