Within the context of a 162-game season, the results of one game don’t typically deserve a whole lot of attention. But sometimes a game ends so oddly, baseball fans can’t help but get a little worked up.
That’s what happened on Thursday when the New York Mets and Miami Marlins battled to what can charitably be described as a curious finish.
The setting was Citi Field, where the Mets were playing their home opener, which also happened to be their first home game under new owner Steve Cohen.
The Marlins were protecting a 2-1 lead as the teams entered the bottom of the ninth. That lead evaporated immediately, thanks to an upper-deck blast by Jeff McNeil, with an epic bat flip thrown in for good measure.
After James McCann grounded out, things got wild. Luis Guillorme singled, Brandon Nimmo doubled and star shortstop Francisco Lindor was intentionally walked to load the bases and set up a potential double play.
Michael Conforto then came to the plate to face Marlins pitcher Anthony Bass. For context, Conforto has struggled this season, with only three hits in 17 at-bats (.176 average).
But he was prepared to battle on Thursday, and that’s what he did. After Bass quickly got ahead with two called strikes, Conforto fouled off a couple of pitches to stay alive, then took a pitch for a ball.
Then Bass threw a slider that was on the inner half of the strike zone. Conforto didn’t offer at the pitch, but instead slightly stuck out his elbow at the last moment.
If you watch the video, you can see umpire Ron Kulpa begin to ring up Conforto with the third strike, before realizing the ball had hit him and awarding him first base. That allowed Guillorme to jog home for the winning run.
Marlins manager Don Mattingly protested the call, gesturing that Conforto made no effort to get out of the way of the pitch. Technically, the batter is required to try to avoid getting hit, but that is rarely called in MLB.
The umpires did check the replay, but they were only allowed to use that technology to determine if the ball had hit Conforto – which it clearly did – not whether or not he tried to avoid it.
As the Mets celebrated, even their own broadcast team knew something was wrong with the play, even though the team they cover came out of the whole thing victorious.
"He stuck his elbow right into that pitch!" announcer Gary Cohen said. "Wowwwwwwwwwwwwwwww."
"You’re trying to get it right," added Ron Darling. "They don’t get it right. So why even have replay?"
Kulpa later acknowledged that he had not made the right call.
"The guy was hit by the pitch in the strike zone," he said. "I should have called him out"
As for Conforto, he said he didn’t lean into the pitch on purpose, claiming that "there may have been a little lift to my elbow just out of habit."
The play led to a fair amount of reaction on social media, with many people critiquing the limitations of replay as opposed to criticizing Conforto.
And Mattingly, while clearly upset about losing the game, admitted that Kulpa probably felt bad about getting the call wrong.
"He knows it was a strike," Mattingly said. "He couldn’t go backwards, in his mind. To be honest with you I bet he feels awful."
In the end, the Mets won the game on what was essentially a walk-off strikeout. An unusual play for sure and something that should not actually be possible. But keep in mind that there was only one out at the time, and the score was tied. The Mets still could have managed to win even if Conforto had been called out.
For his part, Conforto seemed ready to move on.
"I knew there was going to be controversy," Conforto said. "A win’s a win. It’s over. Obviously, I’d like to use the bat next time."
And that’s the essence of baseball. One day ends weirdly, now it’s time to look ahead to the next one. The teams are off on Friday but play again on Saturday and Sunday. It will be interesting to see what happens then.
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