Bill Miller ejects Brett Lawrie, Lawrie hits him with helmet

[Jeremy_UEFL]

Wow....this should be a bigger suspsension than Yadier Molina's "spittle" incident last year with Drake. Intentional or not...throwing th helmet in the vicinty of Miller...he meant to slam his helmet there, doesn't matter if he meant to hit Bill. Bill missed the calls, but unacceptable dispaly of anger by Lawrie.

http://mlb.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=21468797&c_id=mlb

[Welpe]

Hmmm, I'm wondering if Lawrie's mouth got his zone expanded a little bit. I love that one of the BUs came in and told him to leave and leave NOW.

[johnnyg08]

That was the most forceful BU "leave now" I've seen in a long time.

He'll have some time off.

[Umpire in Chief]

That was Dan Iassogna, That was one of the first things I noticed about how quickly he came in and took control of the situation.

Another thing I noticed is that it looked like the Jays skipper got a little spittle on Miller by the way he wiped his brow at about 1:16.

[Mike Prince]

Watched this on TV this morning, Miller also got a beer dumped on him at the end of the game as he left the field. (Edit - oops, it's also in the posted clip. Sorry)

I predict a 5-game suspension for Mr. Lawrie.

[jmpnjmy]

I'm betting it's closer to 10 games

[James Walker]

And people wonder why there are so many ejs of coaches and player in little league and high school. They have brought up to learn that its acceptable because guys in the majors do it. If he doesn't get 10+ games, its an outrage. These players need to be held accountable for their actions.

[johnnyg08]

Totally agree. However, I also think that some umpires at the amateur level don't take care of business soon enough either.

Heck, I've worked with guys who haven't had an EJ in 20 years.

[Guest]

Brett Lawrie is the face of baseball in Canada. A BC boy playing for his country's team who really relates to the audience the Jays are trying to target - definitely a lot of pressure for a 22 year old. Definitely not an acceptable reaction under any circumstance. You'd like to see the MLB hand him a stiff suspension to show everyone this kind of behaviour is unacceptable, but at the same time they have been pretty soft with suspensions so who knows.

BUT

WTF is Bill Miller doing? This is 2012, not 1970. If you don't like the way a player reacts to a call, you do not shove it up his ass on the next pitch, especially in a 4-3 game where two pitches in a row should have put the tying run on base. That just looks bad on the entire profession. Neither of those pitches, especially because F2 clearly pulled them in / down, are even close to strikes at the MLB level.

[ump96]

Brett Lawrie is the face of baseball in Canada. A BC boy playing for his country's team who really relates to the audience the Jays are trying to target - definitely a lot of pressure for a 22 year old. Definitely not an acceptable reaction under any circumstance. You'd like to see the MLB hand him a stiff suspension to show everyone this kind of behaviour is unacceptable, but at the same time they have been pretty soft with suspensions so who knows.

BUT

WTF is Bill Miller doing? This is 2012, not 1970. If you don't like the way a player reacts to a call, you do not shove it up his ass on the next pitch, especially in a 4-3 game where two pitches in a row should have put the tying run on base. That just looks bad on the entire profession. Neither of those pitches, especially because F2 clearly pulled them in / down, are even close to strikes at the MLB level.

This.

I'm guessing Lawrie gets 5-10 games for that.

[Mudder]

No question Lawrie should be suspended, thats a no brainer, but on the flip side, other than UMP24 I've heard no feedback on how bad those 2 strike calls were? I know we try and see our fellow umpire's POV on every controversial call and determine what they're seeing, but those were just very bad calls plain and simple.

BTW, do you think Lawrie's suspension will be mitigated by the fact the helmet hit Miller accidentally on the deflection off the ground, instead of being thrown directly at him?

[johnnyg08]

The strike three seemed to be out of the strike zone.

[benrosen]

I think Miller should be the one suspended. Those calls were terrible!

[sdix00]

K3 was rough.

I've seen plenty of these K2's called at the MLB level. I love how they go the the overhead cam to look at K2 - "This will really show if it got any of the plate." Yeah it was off the plate, but that camera and the standard cam are clearly not centered on the plate either and are skewed to the right, changing the perception.

No way it was more than three inches off.

Zero problems with the k2 call.

Also, if MLB doesn't send a message here, it will hurt all umpires at every level.

.

[hbk314]

BTW, do you think Lawrie's suspension will be mitigated by the fact the helmet hit Miller accidentally on the deflection off the ground, instead of being thrown directly at him?

I don't think it can be considered an accident. He spiked it right at his feet and kept charging after it hit him.

[Mr Umpire]

Whether the calls were right or not is beside the point. Again, another example of why the equipment should not be thrown. Once released, no one knows where it may go. Again, what an idiot.

I think Miller should be the one suspended. Those calls were terrible!

Why would an umpire be suspended IF he truly missed them? The first one was reasonable. Second one, who knows why he called it up there.

[johnnyg08]

If he admits it was a FYC, then we have a whole other story to discuss. Since that will not be happening, he simply missed the pitch.

[Mr Umpire]

Well, regardless of if it was an FYC, Lawrie is an idiot. And, if it was, then suspend Miller. But, his suspension better be right there along with Lawrie's and no where near as long as Lawrie's should be.

[JaxRolo]

I think Miller should be the one suspended. Those calls were terrible!

Yeah right!!! Is this coming from a Canadian????

[johnnyg08]

Miss the call or not, it's not an excuse for that behavior.

[Mudder]

Please forgive my ignorance trying to keep up with the acronyms, FYC???

[James Walker]

The k2 was close, could've gone either way... The k3 was high and away. I don't know how everyone else does it, but if it misses just a bit one way, I call it (ie barely outside). If its bad both ways (ie high and away), definite ball. I will assume that miller was a bit mad about being shown up on the o2, but that's still not a reason to ring someone up on a bad call. As for the helmet toss, he through it at miller, regardless of how or when it hit him, he still through it at him. Total bs on the battered part. As for the FYC, I don't know either. Assuming f*** you call.

[James Walker]

Also, its away, so we tend to give a little more room out there. It's the hardest pitch to call. These guys have been playing for 15-20 years, so the should know by now that they get more out there. Just my $.02.

[Mike Prince]

So there's plenty of terrible calls every season. But no matter how bad the call(s) may be in this case it does not justify the reaction.

Would have been interesting to see what would have happened if the helmet didn't hit him and Dan Iassogna didn't get there in time.

[Jeremy_UEFL]

On the strike three pitch, it was actually not outside...it was over the plate. It was high, but the location of it to the average hitter would have hit the very TOP of the zone. So it is possible maybe Miller's eye level was the same as an average batter, lined with the TOP of the zone.