Frustration set in for the Washington Nationals Sunday against the Baltimore Orioles. The Nationals weren’t happy with the balls and strikes call from home plate umpire Will Little. And they let him know it to extent of hitting coach Kevin Long being ejected and Anibal Sanchez becoming the second Washington pitcher removed from the stands this week.
The sequence was sparked by Little’s calling a pitched that appeared outside the zone a strike to Juan Soto. Manager Dave Martinez wasn’t happy.
The very next pitch was well outside the zone, and yet Little rung Soto out.
A great deal of commotion followed with Long being heard loud and clear dropping an “F-bomb” at Little.
Warning: NSFW language
Sanchez was later removed from the stands. Officially his removal was listed as an ejection. Following the game, Martinez explained Sanchez wasn’t ejected was asked to leave the stands by the umpires.
“Just to clarify, Sánchez didn’t get thrown out of a game, he just got asked to leave the stands,” Martinez said per Patrick Reddington of Federal Baseball.
Earlier this week, Stephen Strasburg was ejected from a game from the stands against the New York Mets. Strasburg was arguing balls and strikes much like Sanchez.
No fans in the stands has presented sounds that normally wouldn’t be so obvious to umpires and picked up on TV audible. Martinez said he becoming aware of the issue of the hot mic.
“I just heard the audio with K Long. It’s something that we have to talk about,” Martinez said per Reddington. “We’re all competing and all trying to do our best. Those things happen. It kind of sucks that you can hear everything. I try to muffle everything with this mask.”
The silence in the stands have made every verbal reaction from the dugouts more glaring. A hot mic caught umpire Tim Timmons dropping an “F-bomb” at Detroit Tigers manager Ron Gardenhire Sunday as well.
Martinez joked he’s just glad that audible was unable to pick what he said during his tirade in Game 6 of the World Series last year saying, “Woof, that would not have been good.”
