Did Troy Tulowitzki deserve to get hit by Ubaldo Jimenez yesterday?
Whether he did or didn’t, spring training and the first pitch Jimenez threw to him were completely inappropriate circumstances in which to do it.
What if the ball had broken Tulowitzki’s hand or wrist? Or worse, hit him in the head or face?
Was Jimenez’s form of field justice worth the punishment of threatening Tulowitzki’s and the Rockies’ season? Possibly his career?
There are times when a pitcher has to throw at a hitter and if he happens to get hurt and miss a few games, so be it.
Whether it’s to send a message and retaliate or for any other viable reason, it has to be done.
Like it or not, it’s a necessary part of the game.
But Jimenez’s actions with Tulowitzki did little more than validate the implication by Tulowitzki and other Rockies’ players that Jimenez has immature tendencies and is still harboring bitterness toward his erstwhile club—so much bitterness that he decided to overtly throw at their best player without pretense or a half-hearted attempt to mask what he was doing. That he charged Tulowitzki, went into over the top chest thumping and challenged him to a fight only adds to the evidence of Jimenez’s intent.
You can read about the incident here in a story from the Denver Post.
Tulowitzki and Jimenez had gone back and forth in the media this spring. The case can be made that the Indians should’ve thought twice about pitching Jimenez against the Rockies. Since Bud Selig was in attendance, Jimenez is going to get suspended.
If Jimenez was so offended by the way the Rockies treated him and was unhappy about the comments made by former teammates, the Indians had to know about it, so the Indians are also at fault.
Jimenez let the macho, “I’m a man” nonsense cloud his judgment and perception of what was an appropriate response to the Rockies.
If Jimenez was out to prove a point, he managed to do it, but it wasn’t the point he wanted to prove.
All he did was tear down the ambiguity as to which side was right and which was wrong in the sniping that has been aired since Jimenez was traded. The maturity issues and selfishness exemplified in yesterday’s planning, acting and aftermath are large factors in the Jimenez trade and why the perceived “offensive” comments were stated by the Rockies’ players in the first place.
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