Near the end of the Oakland Athletics' 6-3 victory over the Detroit Tigers, A's closer Grant Balfour and Tigers batter Victor Martinez nearly came to blows in the middle of Martinez's at-bat.
The fuse was lit out of nowhere; after a foul ball by Martinez on a 1-2 pitch, started barking at him, prompting a profane response. The two started marching toward each other and the benches cleared, as did the bullpens. After the game Martinez said, "Not even the greatest closer acts like that. That's Mariano Rivera."
The way Balfour tells it, however, he wasn't the instigator. According to the A's closer Martinez unnecessarily stared him down after fouling off the 1-2 pitch.
"When a guy stares you down like that, never pitched inside the whole at-bat, and just gave me the death stare, I told him, 'What's your problem staring at me?' You know," Balfour said. "Then he wanted to jaw and come out."
When told of this Martinez replied, "I just swung at the pitch and looked at him. Is that illegal? If that's illegal, somebody from the MLB come and let me know."
The childlike back-and-forth continued as Balfour retorted, "He can stare at me. I don't care. But don't be throwing a bad word out to me. I'm not a rookie. I'm not a little kid. Come on. I won't be intimidated by little stuff like that."
Tigers manager Jim Leyland didn't seem to think much of the ruckus, intimating that high intensity playoff baseball can get the better of any player. "It's playoff baseball, and the guy was wound up a little bit, came off yelling at Victor and Victor took offense to it," Leyland said. "And I don't blame him."
Even Balfour's teammate Brandon Moss admitted he could see where Martinez was coming from in his anger. "Honestly, I know that Balfour is fiery on the mound," Moss said. "He's yelling a lot and spitting everywhere. It's who he is. You know, sometimes it can ruffle the feathers of other teams. Being a hitter, I can see where it's frustrating."
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