PHOENIX -- Two contending teams -- the Orioles and Diamondbacks -- locked up in a good game Tuesday night in which the D-backs managed to come away with a 4-3 win.
But the main thing people in attendance, 23,843 and 718 dogs on Bark at the Park Night, or watching on TV are going to remember is the wild top of the seventh inning.
With the D-backs leading 4-2, it started innocently enough when Cedric Mullins led off with a double and Tyler O’Neill stepped to the plate. With a 2-2 count, O’Neill checked his swing on a pitch and the Diamondbacks appealed to first base umpire Laz Diaz, who ruled there was not a swing.
“Obviously, they didn’t like it,” Diaz said of the Diamondbacks.
No, they sure didn’t, but right-hander Merrill Kelly and his Arizona teammates became more outraged by it when O’Neill walked on the next pitch.
Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo then went to the mound to take Kelly out. When he got to the mound he asked his players to remain calm so no one got thrown out of the game.
As Lovullo was delivering his message, he heard the crowd roar and saw Diaz throwing out Kelly as he walked off the field. Kelly had been barking (no pun intended) at Diaz, who had had enough.
“As he was walking off the mound, he looked back and kept talking,” Diaz said. “At that time, I already gave him his warning to just knock it off. And I ejected him there.”
That set Lovullo off and he went nose-to-nose in an argument that led to his ejection as well. Interestingly, it was Kelly’s second ejection of his career and both times it happened while he was walking off the field after being removed from the game and both times Lovullo got ejected as well.
And that sequence wasn’t even the craziest part of the inning.
The Orioles eventually loaded the bases and Jackson Holliday lifted a fly ball to left that Lourdes Gurriel Jr. made a sliding catch on. Gurriel got up and fired the ball over everyone’s head and to the backstop.
Mullins, who was on third, tagged up and scored, but O’Neill appeared to think the ball had hit the ground and he ran from second to third without tagging.
That led to chaos as the umpires tried to sort everything out.
“On the play, we had a catch, which was something that happened quickly,” Diaz said. “So, once a catch was made, and he [Gurriel] came up throwing, Mike [Estabrook, third base umpire] went back to third base thinking he had a close play at third, whether it was a tag up or the force play. So, he didn't make the mechanic [signal a call].”
That was the one beef the Orioles seemed to have on the play was that no call was made.
"Yeah, it’s a tough play for everybody at that point,” Orioles manager Brandon Hyde said. “I’d like to see a call on the field. Nobody saw it. I thought Ced ran the bases extremely well and did the right thing."
Said O’Neill, "Yeah, pretty crazy play. First thing I saw, I thought Gurriel trapped it, so I was trying to stay closer to third base and trying to score on the play. I was trying to stay aggressive out there. Took a peek at the umpires, I didn't see any signal there was a catch or anything, so I just kind of went about my business. Obviously, seeing it on the replay, he made a heck of a catch. Just one of those baseball plays that didn't go our way."
The umpires huddled on the field to discuss things and both teams challenged the two parts of the play -- whether Mullins tagged at third and whether O’Neill did so at second.
“There were actually four challenges,” Diaz said. “The catch. The two tag-ups. And which way they tagged [on] the appeal. It's going take a little bit longer because it was a big play and there were a lot of moving parts.’’
When all was said and done, Mullins scored on the throwing error by Gurriel and O’Neill was doubled off second base for the third out of the inning. Mullins' run made the score 4-3 -- and that's the way the game ended.
In the end, the replay system worked and even on a contentious night, both teams agreed they ended up with the right call and the only howling left when it was over came from the dogs.