KANSAS CITY -- Royals manager Matt Quatraro is typically as even-keeled as it gets when he’s at the ballpark, not usually letting things get to him, at least publicly. But his interaction, and eventual ejection, with crew chief Chris Guccione on Tuesday night was as fired up as anyone has seen Quatraro on the field.
The reason?
A reversed balk call and a run taken off the board in the Royals’ eventual 6-3 loss to the Marlins at Kauffman Stadium, beginning Kansas City’s penultimate homestand on a sour note despite it being just the club’s fourth loss in the past 17 games since Aug. 16.
Here was the situation: After being shut out for seven innings, the Royals’ offense had some life in the bottom of the eighth against Marlins reliever Victor Vodnik. Carter Jensen doubled home a run, and Bobby Witt Jr.’s sacrifice fly brought home another while moving Jensen to third base with two outs.
In a 1-0 count against Jac Caglianone -- who could very likely be the August American League Player of the Month -- Vodnik stepped off the mound. But as he did so, his right cleat caught the edge of the rubber, leading to a slight stumble. He stepped to the bottom of the mound to reset.
First-base umpire Nestor Ceja called a balk. Jensen jogged home for a run.
“I saw him kind of step off, and I saw the top of his foot hit the rubber before he stepped off,” Jensen said. “I didn’t hear anybody say anything, so I kind of turned my back. And then Vance told me it was a balk. I was thinking in my mind, ‘I thought that was a balk,’ but I didn’t hear it at first.”
Vodnik and the Marlins were confused about the call, with Marlins manager Clayton McCullough coming out of the dugout for an explanation. At that point, the umpiring crew was already huddling.
The result of that conversation: A reversal. The crew deemed that Vodnik didn’t balk; rather, he stumbled as he was trying to make a disengagement. They didn’t want to penalize him for that.
Guccione waved Jensen -- who had already gone through the high-five line in the dugout -- back out to third. The Royals’ deficit went from three back to four.
“It looked strange on the field when it happened,” Guccione told a pool reporter. “So I wanted to get the crew together to make sure that what we saw was correct and if we needed to change anything. After we got together as a crew, we realized a couple of things. He was trying to come -- he was trying to make a proper disengagement, which we felt like he did, even though his cleat caught on the rubber, which made him kind of stumble. That was another factor.
“The other factor was that they were having PitchCom problems. So that was another problem. So we wanted to try to iron that out. I know that Matt didn’t like the run coming off the board, but we felt like even watching what we saw here [postgame] on the replay was the correct call.”
Indeed, Quatraro did not like the run coming off the board, nor the balk call being reversed, which happens so rarely. Guccione can only remember one other time in his career that he’s made a reversal like Tuesday. Balks themselves can be so subjective, and the calls or non-calls surrounding them can be frustrating. According to the MLB rulebook, a balk occurs when a pitcher makes an illegal motion on the mound that the umpire deems to be deceitful to the runner(s).
“It’s hard to get balks called,” Quatraro said. “It’s not a common thing. And then to see it overturned, I think my frustration was more just that it seemed like they were looking for a reason to overturn it when that call doesn’t usually come from second base or home plate, just because of the nature of the balk itself. But just more frustrated at where it was in the game and what a big spot it was.”
As for whether it was actually a balk, Quatraro conceded that it probably wasn’t. But that wasn’t his point.
“He was trying to step off and got his cleat caught,” Quatraro said. “But sometimes your intention isn’t what ends up being what matters, right? Sometimes you either do or you don’t, and the call was made.”
Quatraro and Guccione went after each other for a bit before Quatraro finally went inside. After all that, Caglianone flied out to left field to end the inning. The Royals got that run back in the ninth on Nick Loftin’s home run, but the damage had already been done earlier when the Marlins tagged starter Randy Dobnak for a season-high six runs in six-plus innings.