In Phillies news tonight, the Philadelphia Phillies had a bizarre set of circumstances come up in their game with the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday night.
According to Mark Townsend of Yahoo! Sports, "Philadelphia Phillies skipper Ryne Sandberg approached home plate umpire Mark Wegner one batter into the top of the eighth inning during their game against the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday night."
"It was unclear initially what his intentions were, but it soon became obvious that he had an issue with something pertaining to D-Backs pitcher Oliver Perez, who had just retired left-handed hitter Chase Utley and was then set to face Ryan Howard," wrote Townsend in article posted Saturday night.
The "issue" was Oliver Perez's undershirt which had slits in the arm, causing the sleeves to flap around and distract Phillies' batters --
"Noticed it from the dugout. It was just flopping," Sandberg stated to reporters afterward. "There was a lot of movement there with the delivery. It was fairly obvious with that much movement on it that it would be distracting."
Perez left the mound in a huff, initially leading spectators to believe he may have been ejected. Yet, the umpires had just ordered him to go into the dugout and remove the undershirt.
The game would proceed as normal afterwards. However, Diamondbacks' manager Kirk Gibson had plenty to say after the fact:
"[The umpire] said that one sleeve was longer than the other and he had a little tear in it," he stated. "There was nothing we could do about it. The rule says it's supposed to be the same length, the same color. And it can't be flapping. I have a pretty good idea whose call that was in the other dugout and it wasn't Sandberg."
He was then asked if he was referring to Larry Bowa, the Phillies' bench coach.
Gibson quipped: "You figure it out!"