Just Saw Something New Tonight
 

You figure that if you've watched major league baseball for about fifty years, there is nothing you haven't seen before. But I just saw something that was a first.

Brett Gardner of the Yankees was at bat, and he squared around to bunt. The pitch was way inside and it plunked him on the thigh. He trotted off to first base, but the ump disallowed the HBP, called the pitch a strike, and sent him back to the plate.

As it turned out, he missed the bunt and therefore the strike superseded the hit by pitch. So once he missed it, the rest of the play was dead.

You learn something new every day. Anybody ever see this before?

Actually, I have seen that a few times over the years.

What I haven't seen or heard of before is what happened to Miami the night that Giancarlo Stanton was beaned. The ump ruled that he offered at the pitch (he did not) and thus it was a swinging strike that hit him in the face. Then, on the very next pitch, the pinch hitter that came in for Stanton mid-AB was hit by the same pitcher, on the hand, and again the ump ruled that he swung for strike three. Two pitches, two guys hit, and one strikeout the result. Seems unlikely that has happened before.

That is pretty unusual. The thing about the Gardner play is he was diving out of the way of the pitch, so it was almost impossible to see that he actually missed the bunt. I guess on reflection it is not an impossible situation, but it looked so bizarre and I can't recall ever seeing it before.