Punches Exchanged Between San Diego Padres and Chicago Cubs

By David
Kaye

First it was a brawl between teammates Carlos Zambrano and Michael Barrett. Now the Cubs have focused their attention to fighting with their opponents.

In Saturday's 1-0 lose first baseman Derrek Lee retaliated from an inside pitch thrown by the Padres' Chris Young by attacking him. It was a battle of heavyweights with Lee registering at 6-foot-5 and Young 6-foot-10.

After being plunked on the side of the head by Young's fastball Lee gingerly walked down the first base line starring the Padres right-hander square in the face. By all indications Young said some inappropriate words to Lee and that triggered a benches clearing brawl where both men began to take cheap shots at each other.

Luckily, no punches were landed cleanly, but according to http://www.mlb.com/ San Diego's Jake Peavy was seen sucker-punching the Cubs first baseman. When the melee was over and the umpires had seperated both teams four people in total were ejected.

The Padres' two best starting pitchers, Chris Young and Jake Peavy were tossed from the game, while the Cubs' biggest offensive threat Derrek Lee and hitting Gerald Perry were ejected for their inexcusable actions.

The one major shock from this incident was that the two players who instigated the brawl are two of the best behaved and like able players throughout MLB. Young and Lee are stand up guys who represent the game of baseball in the best possible light and would never be suspected of fighting.

The unfortunate part of this fracas is that lengthy suspensions are sure to loom. Even though San Diego might lose Young for only one start, the Cubs will be without their power hitting first baseman for the next 3-5 games. Third baseman Aramis Ramirez is currently on the disabled list with left patellar tendinitis and will not be available to return until this weekend at the earliest.

At 31-36 and 6.5 games behind the upstart Brewers for the division lead the Cubbies can ill afford to lose one of their premier players. This deplorable incident should serve as a remainder to all little leaguers that the actions of big leaguers on television are not always correct and should not be condoned.