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HOUSTON -- Los Angeles Angels catcher Jonathan Lucroy was carted off the field in the eighth inning after a collision at the plate with the Houston Astros' Jake Marisnick.
The Angels said Lucroy was taken to the hospital for a CT scan and will be evaluated for a possible concussion and fractured nose.

"It certainly didn't look like a clean play,'' Angels manager Brad Ausmus said after his team fell to the Astros 11-10 in 10 innings. "I don't know what actually happened, but it looked like Marisnick took a step to the left and bowled into him with his arm up. The call was right. Really, I think Major League Baseball should probably take a look at it. Consider some type of suspension, quite frankly.''

Ausmus said he hadn't spoken to Lucroy since the game ended, but that he tried talking to him on the field and "he was pretty confused at the time.''

The bases were loaded with the game tied at 10 when Marisnick attempted to score on a sacrifice fly by George Springer.

Marisnick crashed into Lucroy as the catcher attempted to field the throw, and Lucroy immediately fell on his back. He didn't move for a few seconds before struggling to sit up. Marisnick tagged home and then leaned over Lucroy to see if he was OK. Lucroy lifted his head off the ground a few seconds later as blood dripped from his nose.

Angels players rushed to the plate as trainers checked on him. He was lifted to a sitting position after a couple of minutes and held a towel to his nose. He was then helped to a cart and taken off the field while clutching a bloodstained towel.

Marisnick was called out for colliding with Lucroy, and the call was upheld after a crew-chief review to end the inning. Marisnick veered out of the baseline and lowered his shoulder to make contact with Lucroy. Marisnick and Lucroy banged heads on the play, and the back of Lucroy's head also struck the infield dirt.

"I watched the play again and it looks -- he just drops right in front of me and once I kind of made a decision it was too late,'' Marisnick said. "It was a bad play and I hope he's OK.''
Astros manager AJ Hinch said Marisnick didn't intend to injure Lucroy.

"I don't fault Jake because he wasn't hunting him, he wasn't going after him,'' Hinch said. "He tried to take a step on where Lucroy was going to go, and it's difficult in that little 1-3 foot circle where you're trying to figure out going at full speed what's going to happen. It just turned out to be an ugly play.''

Marisnick added that he planned to reach out to Lucroy to check on him.

First off, I'll go on record as saying The Rule is bogus, just like the second base rule.

On this particular play, Lucroy seemed to be moving into the basepath from fair territory and Marisnek went inside (away from Lucroy's momentum) to score. Lucroy then reversed direction to grab the throw.

Before the rule(s) how many guys were injured in collisions at home or second base? Posey and Tejada? Maybe two or three others? They are lame rules that take some baseball out of the game. If you are allowed to hit the catcher, he's got 2 things to think about. If you are allowed to hit the pivot man at second base, he's got 2 things to think about. I remember many, many years ago breaking a kid's ankle on a steal of 2nd base the first year our league had immovable bases (1970). Thing is, he used poor technique placing his foot on the side of the bag facing first base instead of the side of the bag facing right field. It was quite scary for me after the fact because along with the ambulance, the cops came and performed an interview about the incident. Years later I realized the ridiculousness of that. My points are, they didn't go back to the moving bases but instead educated middle infielders on how to receive a throw at second base and it's incredible how many major league players use the same incorrect footwork.

On the Marisnek/Lucroy collision Brad Ausmus proved what an asshole he is by calling for a suspension of Marisnek. But he's an ex-catcher!!!

PARAM wrote:First off, I'll go on record as saying The Rule is bogus, just like the second base rule.

On this particular play, Lucroy seemed to be moving into the basepath from fair territory and Marisnek went inside (away from Lucroy's momentum) to score. Lucroy then reversed direction to grab the throw.

Before the rule(s) how many guys were injured in collisions at home or second base? Posey and Tejada? Maybe two or three others? They are lame rules that take some baseball out of the game. If you are allowed to hit the catcher, he's got 2 things to think about. If you are allowed to hit the pivot man at second base, he's got 2 things to think about. I remember many, many years ago breaking a kid's ankle on a steal of 2nd base the first year our league had immovable bases (1970). Thing is, he used poor technique placing his foot on the side of the bag facing first base instead of the side of the bag facing right field. It was quite scary for me after the fact because along with the ambulance, the cops came and performed an interview about the incident. Years later I realized the ridiculousness of that. My points are, they didn't go back to the moving bases but instead educated middle infielders on how to receive a throw at second base and it's incredible how many major league players use the same incorrect footwork.

On the Marisnek/Lucroy collision Brad Ausmus proved what an asshole he is by calling for a suspension of Marisnek. But he's an ex-catcher!!!

To be clear, I am mostly in agreement with what you are saying and in no way I am defending the "rules"
The only thing I say about that play is that now the rule is in play, guys aren't prepared for contact. And that makes them more susceptible to injury imo. So with that in mind, there should be little tolerance towards breaching that trust.
That said, I haven't seen the play so I bear no opinion on the matter, but a manager crying about a lack of suspension is never a good look....
As for the 2B situation, I hate that they have taken "breaking up the DP" out of play, but at least they added the caveat that the phantom tag of 2B is no longer allowed.

dieterbrock wrote:As for the 2B situation, I hate that they have taken "breaking up the DP" out of play, but at least they added the caveat that the phantom tag of 2B is no longer allowed.

And the "in the vicinity" foot tag/dance around second base.

Definitely a hard collision. I honestly don't think he intended to hurt the catcher. He just made a bad play. He even admitted as such. His actions immediately after the collision looked more like "I screwed up! I hope he's not hurt". I seriously doubt there was malicious intent on the runner's part. He just made the wrong decision to try and score a run. They were right to call him out.

As far as suspension, even though I don't believe there was malicious intent, I still think he should be suspended for a few games. The rule is in place to protect both players. They need to crack down on infractions so it will be in their heads they can't do things that put themselves or other players at risk. Kinda like the NFL forcing defensive players to change they way they tackle to reduce injuries.

PARAM wrote:And the "in the vicinity" foot tag/dance around second base.

Yeah, that's what I meant. Used to drive me nuts, so they at least got something right.
Don't get me started on the intentional walk nonsense....

snackdaddy wrote:Definitely a hard collision. I honestly don't think he intended to hurt the catcher. He just made a bad play. He even admitted as such. His actions immediately after the collision looked more like "I screwed up! I hope he's not hurt". I seriously doubt there was malicious intent on the runner's part. He just made the wrong decision to try and score a run. They were right to call him out.

As far as suspension, even though I don't believe there was malicious intent, I still think he should be suspended for a few games. The rule is in place to protect both players. They need to crack down on infractions so it will be in their heads they can't do things that put themselves or other players at risk. Kinda like the NFL forcing defensive players to change they way they tackle to reduce injuries.

I don't believe there was malicious intent either. I believe he saw Lucroy lunge towards the line to grab the ball and he decided to go inside. It appeared to me that both players made moves perpendicular (to a degree) to the baseline. Mariznik chose the inside line and Lucroy moved left then came back into his path. Had he chose the outside line and Lucroy kept going that way, it's the same result, right down to calling him out and suspending him. But why? Sometimes, in spite of a protection rule there's a play undefined by it. Except Lucroy got hurt. It's not unlike the wide receiver who ducks causing a head to head because the defender was going low. To me it's certainly an unfortunate play but in reality, just a bad collision.

Here's a video of it:

This is a classic case of the NFL protecting the QB. I get it. But this isn't a maiming the QB play.

I've been in enough home-plate collisions and slides to see that this was not an avoidable collision.

First of all the pitcher went where he was supposed to be, to back up a throw that might get past the catcher.

The short throw from the outfielder, and the 3rd base coach sending him put the runner into a dangerous situation, the runner wants to score and avoid the easy out that he seems to be destined for.

the catcher set himself up to block the plate to hopefully force a hook-slide to his left and was going to lunge left once he got the ball in his glove.

The runner seemed to fake an outside slide and then attempted to slip inside.

Then the train wreck happened.

It was a BAD THROW from the outfielder. it was a short-hop to the catcher, looks like the ball hit the edge of the turf. Pro-outfielders are trained to give the catcher a long-hop of about 30-40 feet, not a short-hop of 10 or less feet. Quite simply put, the injury was on the right-fielder's part. The outfielder should feel like shit because of his errant throw.

At this fraction of time, the catcher has to assume the runner is going outside. The runner himself isn't watching the throw, he is supposed to be watching the on-deck hitter ... the on-deck hitter is supposed to be waiving him left or right. But wait ... the stands are so close to the plate that it isn't safe for the on-deck hitter to be safely out there. Thus the design of the field eliminated the on-deck hitter from giving directions, leaving the runner to guess.

The short hop off of the turf forced the catcher to move into harms way, which forced the runner with the only choice of raising his arms to protect himself.

The suspension in this case sends the message that the runner should automatically give up and concede himself to being out. That isn't the nature of a competitive runner. Take competitiveness out of the runner? Baseball is boring enough, it doesn't need to be made more boring.

With the short hop the catcher should have let it go and concede the run leaving the pitcher to grab the ball and keep the other runners from advancing. But that is not the nature of a competitive catcher, I don't blame him for adjusting to the short hop.

This was unfortunate. I will be curious of the outcome of the appealed suspension.

But with any NFL helmet to helmet collision, even unavoidable collisions, the appeal will go against the player running into the QB.

The errant throw of the right fielder is the reason for this injury .. but as all QB's throw interceptions, sometimes outfielders make bad throws. I'd feel like shit if I was the outfielder.