This errant Alex Wood pitch ends up halfway to first base
Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Alex Wood is known for having a unique windup. There are a lot of moving parts when he throws a ball, and when things aren’t perfectly in sync, that can lead to some embarrassing results.
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By that, we mean he gives up hard hits or issues more walks than usual. That wasn’t the case during Tuesday’s game against the Philadelphia Phillies. Wood truly experienced an embarrassing result when he tried to throw this pitch.
Confused? So are we.
During his windup, it appears that Wood just simply loses his grip on the ball. Instead of the pitch ending up at its desired target, the ball ends up being weakly tossed over to first base. It doesn’t even make it there, settling between the base and the pitcher’s mound.
The umpires charged Wood with a balk on the play. While this type of thing doesn’t happen often, it was the right call.
Pay attention to that last line. The ball slips out of Wood’s hand and doesn’t end up in foul territory. That’s a balk!
The balk would come back to haunt Wood in more than one way. Not only was it embarrassing, but it led to a run being scored. Wood eventually walked Odubel Herrera, the batter in the video, to load the bases.
Wood was then taken out of the game in favor of Joel Peralta, who promptly gave up a grand slam. Three of those runs wound up being charged to Wood.
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So, yeah, this was a tough one for Wood. He leaves with both his ego and his ERA bruised. You would almost feel bad for him if the errant throw wasn’t so darn funny.
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Chris Cwik is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Chris_Cwik
