Phil Nevin had his own Aaron Boone moment on Saturday night.
The Los Angeles Angels manager Nevin was ejected in the fifth inning of the Angels-Seattle Mariners game for protesting a bad strike call by home plate umpire Phil Cuzzi. On a 3-2 pitch to Shohei Ohtani, Cuzzi called Ohtani out on strikes (when the ball appeared to be clearly off the plate). The always respectful Ohtani even outwardly protested Cuzzi’s call for a moment.
Shohei Ohtani was not happy with this called strike three. Looked like he was shaking his head saying "No. no." pic.twitter.com/f6sKFIE8KL
— Sarah Valenzuela (@Sarah_IsabelVee) June 11, 2023
The Angels were trailing 5-2 with runners on second and third and two outs at the time. Had Cuzzi called the pitch correctly, Ohtani would have drawn a walk, and Mike Trout would have been batting with the bases loaded. But instead, it was an inning-ending strikeout to stamp out the Halos’ hopes.
Nevin started chirping from the home dugout and was soon ejected from the game by Cuzzi. That absolutely set Nevin off. He came charging out of the dugout and went nose-to-nose with Cuzzi, screaming at Cuzzi in a rage.
https://twitter.com/BallySportWest/status/1667742281955155968
At one point, Nevin physically went to home plate and emphatically pointed to where that pitch had been.
Phil Nevin, Umpire Assistant pic.twitter.com/zFcrW619e0
— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) June 11, 2023
Cuzzi is very quickly earning a reputation as one of the worst umpires in baseball. Just a few weeks ago, Cuzzi was sharply criticized for his blown calls during a game involving the other Los Angeles team.
As for Nevin, he is probably just fed up with these types of calls going against his club. Earlier this month, the Angels were already hosed by another horrific strike-three call.
