Major League Baseball managers are required to wear uniforms, which is kind of funny, but it seems a little over the top for skippers to be slapping on jockstraps, no?
Don’t tell that to Joe Maddon.
The Chicago Cubs manager was ejected in the eighth inning Wednesday night at Wrigley Field before his team eventually staved off elimination with a 3-2 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers in Game 4 of the National League Championship Series. Maddon took issue with the umpires overturning what initially was ruled a strikeout of Dodgers outfielder Curtis Granderson, who clearly swung and missed at a pitch in the dirt yet was given new life when the umps came together and determined (incorrectly) that he foul tipped the two-strike offering.
Granderson struck out on the next pitch, Wade Davis pitched a scoreless ninth inning and the Cubs secured a victory, ensuring the botched call didn’t play a factor in the outcome. Maddon gave the umpires an earful before leaving the field, though. And if Granderson had done some damage, it could have been an even more chaotic scene.
“That can’t happen,” Maddon told reporters after the game. “The process was horrible. To have that changed — if Granderson hits the next pitch out, I might come running out of the clubhouse in my jockstrap. That was really that bad. You can’t permit that to happen. The process was wrong.
“The explanation was eventually — eventually — it turned into hearing two sounds. Not one of them saw a foul tip. It was based on two sounds, which I totally cannot agree with that process whatsoever. When you have 40-some thousand people, it’s late in the game, the other sound could have come from some lady screaming in the first row.”
Run out of the clubhouse in a jockstrap? Not sure why Maddon would be wearing one, but point taken.
Maddon’s wacky postgame rant didn’t stop there, either. He also referenced “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,” quoting Will Ferrell’s character to accentuate his point.
“Again, with all due respect to the umpires — and as Ricky Bobby once said, ‘Once you’ve said ‘with all due respect,’ you can say whatever you want.’ With all due respect, under those circumstances, that can’t happen,” Maddon told reporters, drawing some laughs. “It can’t happen.”
The Cubs, who trail 3-1 in the NLCS, will try to send the series back to Los Angeles when the teams square off Thursday night in Game 5 in Chicago.
Thumbnail photo via Jim Young/USA TODAY Sports Images
