The mere speculation that Houston Astros left-hander Framber Valdez would intentionally hit his own catcher in the chest with a pitch is “preposterous” and “a complete lack of respect for who he is as a person,” the pitcher’s agent said Wednesday.
After Tuesday’s game, Valdez said he apologized to catcher Cesar Salazar after hitting him in the chest with a pitch, saying he got “crossed up.”
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The pitcher appeared to shake off Salazar on a 1-0 pitch to the Yankees’ Trent Grisham at the plate with the bases loaded in the fifth inning. Salazar then urged Valdez to step off the mound, but he proceeded with the pitch, which Grisham launched to deep left field for a grand slam to give New York a 6-0 lead in an eventual 7-1 win.
On the second pitch to the next batter, Valdez hit Salazar in the chest with a 93 mph pitch, raising questions about whether he was upset about the Grisham at-bat and if it was intended.
“There’s no questioning what Framber is and what he represents to the team and his thought process on the team,” agent Ulises Cabrera, who represents Valdez, told the Houston Chronicle on Wednesday.
“The idea that he’s intentionally trying to injure one of his teammates is preposterous. It’s a complete lack of respect for who he is as a person and who he is as a player. And his body of work demonstrates that. Anything to the contrary is just completely misguided and it’s not right.”
Valdez and Salazar, who were talking when reporters entered the clubhouse after the game, both said that the incident wasn’t intentional, that Salazar had pressed “the wrong button” on his PitchCom transmitter, and that they had sorted things out after the inning and after the game.
“I believe that he was absolutely frustrated, as anybody who ever played any sport … you get frustrated, you get rattled, you’re angry. And these things happen,” Astros general manager Dana Brown told 790 AM in Houston on Wednesday. “Sometimes you get so angry you can’t see straight. And he crossed him up. They had a conversation after the game, and they squashed it.”
Astros manager Joe Espada on Wednesday said he met with both players at the same time following Tuesday’s game because he “wanted to hear the truth” about the events of the inning.
“I really wanted to get down to, No. 1, asking [Valdez] to step off [the mound],” Espada said. “I wanted to know about the thought process — which pitch, who was calling which pitch and what — and I wanted to hear from both of them at the same time. I wanted to have a conversation face to face because I wanted to hear the truth about the whole entire thing that happened in that inning.”
Cabrera said Valdez was surprised by the idea that he would intentionally hit Salazar.
“In no way, shape or form does the starting pitcher intentionally try to hurt his teammate,” Cabrera told the Chronicle. “Mix-ups happen all the time, just like a pitcher shaking [off a pitch] all the time. This is just not an issue.
“But it does become an issue when people question Framber’s quality as a teammate and his interest in defending his fellow players in the dugout on the field. He messed up. He admitted it. He got mixed up. Done. But to suggest anything other than that is just wrong and it’s not acceptable.”
Espada just wants all parties to move on from the incident.
“I want to put this behind us,” Espada said. “There is a lot of speculation and stuff that has been said in the media … and I don’t like it. A lot of that stuff is not true. But I understand the environment and what comes with it. I appreciate if we could just get past this and go back to just baseball.”
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
