Question for you baseball aficionados

[Q-Unit]

AP - There was a brief scrum in the bottom of the eighth after Indians closer Kerry Wood's first two pitches went behind and in tight to B.J. Upton. Catcher Victor Martinez, who got out of the way of a high-and-inside pitch earlier in the series, got into a yelling match with someone on the Rays' bench before both dugouts emptied.

Maddon feels Wood was intentionally throwing at Upton in response to the lead-off hitter stealing a base Thursday with the Rays trailing 9-0. Tampa Bay wound up scoring six times in the inning after the stolen base.

- OK so my ? is, with all the inane and stupid baseball deeply rooted "traditions", why is it considered even offensive for someone to steal a base when they are down 0-9? as the report said, the Rays ended up scoring 6x in the inning after that base, they got back in the game, made it closer gave them a shot to win.

- Where is the retribution justified here? I mean I understand in all sports when you are up big, if you can help it, you don't pile on the points. But when you are losing.. and losing pretty big, you are paid (and owe it to your man sized egos) to keep trying no matter what until the game is officially over , keep trying to win no matter what.

baseball and their "traditions"

- And I still dont get why if a guy accidentally throws inside on a pitcher, why can't he at that moment say, "my bad bro that got away from me I didnt mean to try to take your head off", how is that offensive or less macho?

but noooo instead if Pitcher A throws high and in on Batter B, well Pitcher A's teammate, Batter C better watch out cuz in 2 years, Pitcher D a teammate of Batter B is gonna throw high and in on Batter C to send a message to Pitcher A for what he did two years ago

- and dont get me started on pitchers who have a perfect game/no no going in the 7th or later, and the score's like 4-0, and someone GOD FORBID tries to bunt to get something goin, or get on base to you know.... try to WIN THE FCKING game.

its amazing baseball still has the attendance rate it does with all the stupid shyt that goes on, with the game, players, management, etc...

actually the same can be said of all the major sports but reading about the Rays snafu yesterday just spurred this on for me LOL

[gadfly36]

It really is amazing how teams hold grudges. I thought the first pitch to Upton was an accident, but when he came inside the second time it was pretty obvious what was happening. The umps blew it when they didn't at least warn the tribe or maybe throw Woods out. In the ninth Percy couldv'e thrown inside all inning, which he tried to, without trouble. The umps blew the game.