Some Quotes

From Mike Mussina on Shelley Duncan:

“he was right at the bag, spikes high and out by so much that it looked all the worse.”

“I’m all for playing hard, but you have to know what happens in such situations,” Mussina said. “The whole season now there is going to be a cloud over it with everyone waiting for the next whatever to happen. He kept the ball rolling. You like the energy and how he plays, and you believe experience will help him make good decisions.”

From Johnny Damon:

“A lot of veteran guys have talked to him,” Johnny Damon told The Post yesterday. “We are telling him to keep playing hard, but keep the spikes down and the shoulders in (when sliding). This way people see you are playing hard, but no one can question you.”

“I can’t get mad at the guy,” Damon said. “He’s young. We just need to talk to him and tell him to tone it down and tell him to watch out. . . . We love the hard play, but the hard play can’t involve spikes and it can’t involve cutting someone up. When he goes high, it will not just be talk around here. Guys around the league are going to talk.”

And even from Doug Mientkiewicz (who thought to ask HIM?):

Doug Mientkiewicz, Duncan’s teammate last year and a Pirate this season, added, “He hasn’t been around long enough to do stuff like that.”

Johnny hits it best, I think with his “Guys around the league are going to talk” quote. (Dig me, complementing Damon.) And that’s the crux of it. None of the other MLB teams are thinking “Man, we shouldn’t mess with the Yankees now – they’re bad-asses!”. They’re thinking, “That kid’s ass is big enough to hit and make it seem like it was an accident.”.

Here is the best angle I’ve seen of the slide, no mistaken the intent nor how close Duncan got to really hurting Iwamura:
Rays/Yanks brawl

I promise, next post – no Yankees! 🙂