There were some pregame fireworks between Joc Pederson and Tommy Pham on Friday night.
While the San Franciso Giants were taking part in warmups prior to their game against the Cincinnati Reds, Pham walked over to Pederson and slapped him in the face before the pair were separated.
Pham ended up getting scratched from the Reds’ lineup after the incident.
So, inquiring minds want to know: What prompted Pham to slap Pederson seemingly out of nowhere?
“Unfortunate situation. Kind of stemmed from a fantasy football league we both were in last year. I put a player on the injured reserve when they were listed as out and then added another player,” Pederson told reporters, per a clip shared by NBC Sports Bay Area. “And then there was a text message in the group saying that I was cheating because I was stashing players on my bench.
“Then I looked up the rules and sent a screenshot of the rules, how it says that when a player is ruled out, you’re allowed to put them on the IR. That’s all I was doing. It just so happened that he had a player, Jeff Wilson, who was out. He had him on the IR. I said, ‘You literally have the same thing on your team, on your bench.’ … So it feels very similar to what I did. And that was basically all of it. There’s not much more to it.”
Hey, stashing is strategizing.
The entire situation was bizarre, but sometimes fantasy sports can bring out the worst in people.
Major League Baseball is investigating the altercation.
