Royals pitchers Kelvin Herrera, Yordano Ventura punished by MLB after A’s spat

All the blame for an explosive weekend series in Kansas City is going to the Royals, as MLB announced Tuesday that pitchers Kelvin Herrera and Yordano Ventura will be punished for throwing at Brett Lawrie of the Oakland Athletics.

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The A’s received no penalty from the league after the three high-tension games that saw benches clear twice and numerous ejections, particularly Sunday when five Royals were tossed.

From MLB’s announcement:

Herrera has received a five-game suspension and an undisclosed fine for intentionally throwing a pitch in the head area of Brett Lawrie of the A’s in the top of the eighth inning of the Sunday, April 19th game, with warnings in place. Ventura has received an undisclosed fine for intentionally throwing a pitch at Lawrie in the top of the fourth inning of the Saturday, April 18th game.

Unless appealed, Herrera’s suspension is scheduled to begin tonight, when the Royals are to continue their home series against the Minnesota Twins. If appealed, Herrera’s suspension will be held in abeyance until the process is complete.

This opinion doesn’t figure to be popular in Kansas City, where fans have been painting Lawrie as a villain since his take-out slide Friday started the bad blood between the two teams. Royals fans have also maintained that Herrera didn’t throw near Lawrie’s head, a stand the league is obviously disagreeing with.

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The back-and-forth spat between the two teams has included players, managers and even A’s owner Lew Wolff. As recently as Monday, Royals manager Ned Yost made it seem like the Royals weren’t ready for bygones:

Yost spoke w/Herrera. He got message to Lawrie: “You better think about it. Because we’ve got guys that throw 100. You want to mess around?”

— Andy McCullough (@McCulloughStar) April 20, 2015