In the first inning of Tuesday’s game against the Diamondbacks, Giants starting pitcher Jeff Samardzija threw a fastball at the rear end of Paul Goldschmidt, arguably Arizona’s best player, issuing him a free pass to first base, and a bruise that will likely linger for a few days.
The bean came a day after Buster Posey took a fastball off of his helmet from Arizona’s Taijuan Walker in the Giants’ home opener, knocking him out of the game, and onto the 7-day concussion DL. Both manager Bruce Bochy and Samardzija refused to comment on if the plunking of Goldschmidt was a retaliation for Posey after Tuesday’s game, which has lead many to assume that it indeed was.
Giants broadcaster Mike Krukow certainly feels that way, and told Murph and Mac on Wednesday morning that intentionally hitting Goldschmidt as payback was the right thing to do.
“It’s not bizarre, it’s how you deal with it,” Krukow said when asked about hitting Goldschmidt on purpose. “You cannot allow your opponents to hit you, and if you get a head shot, whether it was intentional or not, it doesn’t matter. It happened, and not only that it took down your best guy, and put him on the shelf for at least a week. All those things are things that cannot happen. It’s been a part of the game for a long time.”
For the record, there was little indication that Walker had any intent of hitting Posey on Monday. Walker was remorseful and apologetic in his comments after the game, and said that the Giants coaches knew it was an accident.
“I know (pitching coach Mike Butcher) said he knows some of the coaches over there and they said they all know that it was an accident,” Walker told AZCentral. “It was. It wasn’t on purpose. I don’t know if that (apology) got to him, but I wanted to make sure – I let them know that I’m sorry, that it was an accident.”
“Right when I let go, I tried to almost say, ‘Watch out,’ because I felt it right away. I wasn’t expecting it and he didn’t have time to react because he wasn’t expecting it, either. It was one of those things that happened and it got away from me. It was an accident.”
According to Krukow, however, intent is irrelevant when your best player gets hit in the head.
“I’m from that generation, you got one of ours, we got one of yours. Simple. You get it done, it’s over, and they got it done. To Samardzija’s credit, he got it done right. It was below the belt. He put a bruise on Goldschmidt’s butt, it’ll sit there and it’ll be a little soft advertisement for a couple weeks, depending on how good of a bruiser he is. It’s just a little reminder of how the game is played, and you move on. I hope there’s no repercussions in regards to the league office fining Samardzija because that always frosts me when it happens, but it’s done, it’s over. It was done right and it was done in a professional way.”
Listen to the full interview below.