| Beanball Season |
24 March 2003
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Piazza-Mota War Signals Danger Ahead
Iraq wasn't the only place violence broke out last week. At a baseball field, the New York Mets and the Los Angeles Dodgers had their own brawl after Dodgers pitcher Guillermo Mota threw one at Mets catcher Mike Piazza. Suspensions have been awarded, fines levied, but baseball needs to clamp down on this before it gets serious.
The temptation to throw at a batter is, not surprisingly, great from time to time. Sometimes, he's too close to the plate and needs to be brushed back a little. Sometimes, though, the pitcher is tired of giving up home-run balls and decides that a concussion is in order. then the batter charges the mound. The result can be a bench-clearing punch-up, but something far worse it going to happen soon.
One of these days, the batter is not going to drop the bat when he charges the mound. It will be a career ending act of violence, but for some, maybe with the career on the rocks anyway, perhaps with a little too much of an unproven herbal supplement in the blood stream, beating a pitcher with the bat will be momentarily worth it.
The problem is greater in the American League, where the pitcher doesn't bat thanks to the Nazi- and communist-inspired designated-hitter rule foisted upon baseball by Satan himself. He the pitcher has to bat, he becomes a target for retaliation, and good old deterence comes into effect. However, Mr. Piazza and Mr. Mota play in the National League, so all of baseball is at risk.
The solution is not so clear, because the brush-back pitch and the stuggle for control of home plate is as old as the game itself. And sometimes, the ball really does slip. But the problem is crying out for a solution, before someone quite literally gets killed.