The Boston Red Sox showcased some serious fire both during and after their series-opening victory against the San Francisco Giants on Friday.
Aroldis Chapman’s role in it all was particularly noticeable.
Chapman locked down the save with some serious flair — striking out Heliot Ramos and now-former teammate Rafael Devers in a pair of awesome battles — but it was a relatively innocuous infield popup from Wilmer Flores that really got his juices flowing.
Why?
Flores had engaged in some gamesmanship.
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Chapman was charged with a pitch clock violation and assessed an automatic ball for not looking at the batter in a timely manner. Flores, however, previously made eye contact — signaling that he was good to go — before looking away and causing the pitcher to pause.
“I don’t know, maybe the umpire doesn’t catch that,” Chapman said through an interpreter, as seen on NESN. “I feel like that’s not OK.”
Flores didn’t see the big deal.
“I don’t know. He said something,” Flores said, per Sean McAdam of MassLive. “I wanted to know what he said. Still don’t know…I tried to ask him if he said something. I asked what was going on.”
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The Red Sox and Giants both congregated toward the middle of the diamond, where catcher Connor Wong and pitching coach Andrew Bailey stepped in the way of their hulking closer before things dissipated.
NESN will have full coverage of the rematch on Saturday, with first pitch scheduled for 4:05 p.m. ET.