Before this season umpires hadn’t called Braves left-hander Jaime Garcia for a balk since 2012. Now they’ve called him for two balks in his past two starts, and the latest one cost him a run.
First base umpire Mike Everitt called Garcia for a balk in the sixth inning on Tuesday with runners on first and third and no outs. Phillies outfielder Odubel Herrera advanced from third to score the final run in the 3-1 Braves defeat.
“I don’t agree with it,” Garcia said. “I don’t like it. He made the call… . I don’t know what happened, man. They called a balk on me last game and he was just trying to be smart right there. I don’t agree.”
Garcia also was charged with a balk during the fifth inning of the 2-1 Braves loss at the Angels on Thursday. Garcia got out of that inning when he induced a double-play ground out to end the inning and preserve a 1-0 lead.
Braves manager Brian Snitker earned his first ejection of the season for arguing that balk call. This time he protested from the dugout but didn’t go on the field to confront Everitt, who is a crew chief.
“He’s been (called for) balks the last two moves he’s made and prior to that he wasn’t balked at all, all season,” Snitker said. “I don’t know. I’m just thinking it’s too coincidental, I guess, a little bit maybe. I don’t know if he balked; he might have balked. I haven’t looked at (the replay).”
Does Snitker believe umpires conferred about cracking down on balks in general, or with Garcia specifically?
“I don’t know, I hope it’s all of them if they’re going to do that,” Snitker said. “Because I’ve seen a lot of guys for a while – a lot of guys are balking, so I just kind of assumed they were shying away from all that unless it was just blatant.”
Garcia said he asked Everitt for an explanation for the balk call.
“He wouldn’t even look at me at first,” Garcia said. “And then he acted like I was mad or yelling at him. I was just asking him a normal question. It seems like sometimes they have a little bit of an attitude. For me, it’s out of my control. What I can control is make my pitches and their job is to make those calls and he made it.”
