Francisco Mejia unleashed a perfectly thrown laser beam that nearly took off the pitcher's head

Baseball is a finely rehearsed ballet. Each step, throw and swing is the result of thousands of hours of finely cultivated practice to emerge with the strongest possible outcome with the least amount of waste.

The Padres' Francisco Mejia came awfully close to the bare minimum as he nearly shaved the back of Kirby Yates' head when he threw out Charlie Culberson to help protect the Padres' 4-3 lead. This is a ball straight on the bag, too.

Throw: perfect ?
Pitch: nasty ?
Rally: erased ?#FriarFaithful pic.twitter.com/jHn2SpenJU

— San Diego Padres (@Padres) May 1, 2019

Now, granted, perspective is a thing, but look at this! Both the ball and Yates' head are inside the circle:

Of course, you could say that Yates could have done a little bit more than merely bob his head, but this was rehearsed. He knew exactly how low he'd have to go ... I hope.