Manny Machado has been following the situation with Jake Marisnick closely, and the San Diego Padres slugger is confident he would have been treated much, much differently if it were him who barreled into Los Angeles Angels catcher Jonathan Lucroy at home plate.
Marisnick slammed into Lucroy in a collision at home plate when the Angels played the Houston Astros on July 7. Lucroy was left with a concussion and a fractured nose, and Marisnick is currently appealing the two-game suspension he received from Major League Baseball. Machado shared some of his thoughts on the situation in a rant on Instagram live Tuesday night, and he said he would have been suspended 20 games if he did what Marisnick did to Lucroy.
That was only part of Machado’s rant, which was primarily aimed at MLB Network broadcasters Eric Byrnes and Dan Plesac. Byrnes and Plesac defended Marisnick, and Machado said they did that because they have to “protect their guy.” He also called them the “biggest tools out there.”
Here's Manny Machado's rant from Instagram live about the Jake Marisnick situation and how MLB would have treated him differently https://t.co/ahtihDw17R
— Steve DelVecchio (@SteveDelSports) July 17, 2019
Marisnick was booed by Angels fans during his at-bats in Los Angeles on Tuesday night. Then in the sixth inning, Angels reliever Noe Ramirez hit Marisnick in the back with a pitch that was thrown up around his head. That resulted in the benches and bullpens clearing.
Machado believes Byrnes and Plesac would have said he deserved to have a pitch thrown at his head if he plowed into Lucroy. He also made reference to his recent one-game suspension for arguing balls and strikes.
“Other people do the same, they just get a slap on the wrist,” Machado said. “It’s all good. I just want people out there to understand where we come from, understand what it really is. Don’t listen to these guys on TV. … Latinos have to stick together all day.”
Machado seemed to be implying that he is treated differently by MLB officials, broadcasters and analysts because of his ethnicity. Some would argue that he has brought a lot of the criticism on himself with his dirty play.
H/T New York Post
