Phillies ace Zack Wheeler blasts Blue Jays after Toronto hitting coach is ejected
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Phillies ace Zack Wheeler blasts Blue Jays after Toronto hitting coach is ejected originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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The Philadelphia Phillies lost the series opener to the Toronto Blue Jays in Philadelphia on Friday night after a rain delay pushed the start time back a few hours.
During the game, with Zack Wheeler on the mound, the Blue Jays' hitting coach Dustin Popkins was thrown out of the game for arguing that Wheeler was pitching from off the rubber on the mound. Wheeler then mouthed an expletive towards the Blue Jays' coach.
After the game, Paul Casella of MLB.com shared Wheeler's thoughts on the debacle, and the Phillies ace blasted the Blue Jays amid their struggles this season, poking fun at their losing record this year.
Zack Wheeler pokes fun at Blue Jays for losing record
"I've been pitching over there forever, and I'm gonna keep doing it," Wheeler said. "They've lost a lot of games over there, so they're probably trying to pick some things up to complain about."
The reason why the Blue Jays were yelling out onto the field about Wheeler was that they were arguing that Wheeler was pitching while not staying on the rubber of the mound.
A pitcher has to stay connected while they're pitching, but the Blue Jays believed Wheeler wasn't. The umpires threw out the Toronto hitting coach after he yelled out about Wheeler's positioning on the mound, and Wheeler was clearly not a fan.
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His comment after the game, poking fun at the Blue Jays for losing so much that they are trying to "pick some things up to complain about," comes amid a rough season for Toronto.
After coming just one win from beating the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series, the Blue Jays have struggled this season, being 54-62 on the year heading into Friday's game.
They are only 3.5 games back in the AL Wild Card, but considering they shipped off Kevin Gausman, Daulton Varsho, and Jeff Hoffman at the trade deadline, the Blue Jays knew that they couldn't treat this season as an all-in one.
Wheeler, in fighting back against the Blue Jays' trying to call out his delivery from the mound, mouthed an expletive to the Blue Jays' hitting coach, and then poked fun at Toronto's losing record this season in his post-game interview.
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