Chris Guccione Ejection....

[Fan10]

Disclaimer: I am a Braves fan.

I watched this game from the 2nd inning until the end. There had been a couple of very close pitches earlier in the game that went against us. One was a very borderline called third strike that ended an inning when we had the bases loaded. When this pitch was not called, Buddy Carlyle (our pitcher) was upset, but he turned around to keep from saying something that he would regret.

Instead of doing like Carlyle and trying to avoid a problem, Gucionne came out and started yelling at Carlyle. When that happened, Cox came out and was immediately tossed. I know that his ejection was automatic since he was arguing balls/strikes. However, it seemed to me that Guccione instigated this. Had he done as Carlyle did and backed off, this likely would not have happened. And, of course I can't read the minds of the other three umpires, but their lack of intervention seemed to tell me that they weren't too happy with Guccione. How many times do you see that kind of rhubarb and no intervention from the other umps?

As for Cox spraying him, I found this article with Jerry Crawford telling a story about a time that Cox accidentally sprayed him. This probably was the case here too. http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/column...son&id=2903669