The Oakland Athletics beat the Texas Rangers 4-2 on Saturday afternoon. Rangers starter Matt Garza got victimized early on by the A's thanks to Oakland's aggressive approach. Coco Crisp started the game with a bunt single, and Eric Sogard immediately bunted him over to second. Jed Lowrie followed with an RBI single, and Yoenis Cespedes homered soon after to put Garza and the Rangers in a 3-0 hole just ten pitches into the game.
When Sogard was walking off the field after his successful bunt, Garza and him had some words. In the bottom of the seventh, Sogard squeezed home a run to extend the Athletics' lead to two. Post-game, Garza took to his private Twitter account, and things got ugly. The always entertaining Lana Berry screencapped some of Garza's tweets.
Going after Sogard and his wife for…what exactly? Seems like Garza is juuuuuuuust a little bit angry for some sort of unknown reason. The only tweet on Sogard's wife's account related to the game is this one, which is essentially just praising smallball.
Then Garza went ahead and did this.
Honestly, I'm not sure why Garza is so full of rage. You wanna know why Sogard bunted twice, Matt? Because he's not a great hitter, and you probably weren't expecting it at all. Sacrifice bunting as the second hitter of the game is something that would absolutely drive me crazy as a fan of sabermetrics, but this isn't exactly Joey Votto bunting…it's Eric Sogard. And as for the bunt in the seventh, it's a pretty slick move to push another run across and give your team some insurance.
Garza's reaction reminds me of an MMA fighter who gets angry when his opponent takes him down at will instead of just standing there with his chin out throwing punches. Why be reckless when you can go the safe route and be effective? Bunting is the safe road for Sogard, and trying to smash the ball in the gap or over his fence isn't his game. If you have so much of a problem with what Sogard is doing…why not try to stop him?
Garza closed his evening on Twitter out with the typical response of "sorry I'm so competitive!" At least it's better than "sorry you were offended"…
Ed Note: This post appears courtesy Bloguin's national MLB blog where our Joe Lucia serves as managing editor. Give them a follow @Outside_Corner and bookmark theoutsidecorner.com.