New White Sox Infielder Brett Lawrie, Royals Have A History Of Bad Blood
(CBS) Following the White Sox's acquisition of infielder Brett Lawrie from the Athletics on Wednesday evening, it's worth sharing this nugget: Lawrie doesn't get along with the defending World Series champion Kansas City Royals, whom the White Sox meet 19 times per season.
While the high-octane Lawrie has long hummed to his own beat, with nary a care for what others think, he and the Royals really got after it in 2015.
It all started in Kansas City last April 17, when Lawrie took out Royals shortstop Alcides Escobar on a late slide that wasn't into second base but rather aiming for the infielder.
The Royals were displeased, and the benches emptied.
Escobar sprained his knee and later said he thought it was a dirty play. Lawrie denied that.
"I'm trying to break up a double play there," Lawrie said, according to the Associated Press. "It's a tie game. No one is trying to hurt anyone there. That's just playing the game hard."
Lawrie later texted an apology to Escobar, the AP reported, but it didn't appear to calm any of the furor.
Because a day later, Lawrie was plunked in the left elbow by fiery Royals right-hander Yordano Ventura in a fourth-inning sequence that was clearly retaliation for the previous night's slide. Ventura was ejected, and Lawrie took first base without incident as the benches cleared again.
Then in the Sunday series finale on April 19, the benches emptied for a third consecutive day, which featured a chatoic scene in which five Royals were ejected. The biggest fireworks came in the eighth inning, when Royals reliever Kelvin Herrera threw a 100-mph fastball behind Lawrie's head. Herrera was immediately ejected.
Lawrie was livid upon seeing Herrera point to his head while walking off the field.
Herrera pointed to his head as he went into the dugout, which irritated Lawrie.
"That's what got me hot," Lawrie told the AP. "That's what got me mad. You can't throw at my head and then say, `Next time I face you, it's in the head.' He needs to play for that. He doesn't throw 85. He throws 100."
Herrera was later suspended for five games by MLB. When asked about that, Lawrie ended up torching the Royals fan base.
"That was probably the worst series of baseball that I've ever played," Lawrie told MLB.com then. "I don't think you can even call it baseball, because it wasn't. I've never been a part of anything like that in three days in my entire life. It wasn't baseball. It didn't feel like baseball.
"And the way their fans approached everything, I hated it. The way their fans were antagonizing everything, you know, I got a first-pitch missed curveball up in my head and everyone leaps up in their seat like Bruce Buffer is about to come out. That's not how we're doing things.
"Shame on their fans for antagonizing everything that went on there, because that had a lot to do with it. Shame on the players and their team that went with it. I'm just glad it's all over and we're moving on."
Now, Lawrie moves to a new home in which he'll see the Royals plenty. Stay tuned.
