NEWSLETTER
UPDATE (April 3): Anthony Rendon has been suspended for what happened on Opening Night.
It’s five games, which seems pretty light when you consider he grabbed a fan and took a swing at him:
I wonder if the investigation revealed that Rendon had been unreasonably targeted by the fan (I won’t speculate on the exact nature), which wouldn’t excuse the behavior, but might make it feel less bad?
*Original post follows*
I expect there will be more information and context coming out on this, because any direction confrontation between a player and a fan is big news. And always a big no-no for one or both of them.
After the Angels lost late last night to the A’s, this happened as the Angels were leaving the field:
By the time the video picks up, Anthony Rendon is already getting into it with a fan wearing an A’s cap. Rendon says that the fan called Rendon a name, and it kinda seems like he wants the fan to admit it (fan can be heard denying it). As Rendon lets go of the fan’s shirt and starts to walk off, he takes a swing – it’s hard to tell if the swing was intended to actually land or maybe just take the fan’s hat off. Either way: not good.
Did you see Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani’s faces as they walked by? They knew it was not a good situation, too.
These situations are rare, but always ugly when they happen. I won’t speak to this specific incident because there could still be a whole lot more that we don’t know, but generally, fans should know that taunting has a limit. You can go too far. On the flip side, it’s hard to ever justify a player grabbing a fan like that. We’ll see what comes out, but it just doesn’t look great.
(Also, Rendon is not known as much of a strikeout guy, but he did see his K rate increase to 18.1% last year, highest since 2016. I guess what I’m trying to say is: it’s not all that surprising that he took a swing and missed.)
UPDATE: The Angels had no comment for ESPN, but the league has said it is aware of the incident and it is looking into the matter. It’s hard to imagine the fan and/or Rendon escaping any consequences.
