Acuña steals second base ... and tries to return it
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The sky is blue, water is wet and Ronald Acuña Jr. plays hard. You didn't need to hear any of that from us.
But during the Braves' 5-4 loss to the Padres on Friday night at Truist Park, he took it a little bit beyond what we're accustomed to.
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In the fifth inning, the outfielder reached first base on a fielder's choice and then stole second. It was, for all intents and purposes, a routine sequence. It just ended up being a sequence that ended with Acuña knocking the second base bag out of the ground, raising questions about whether a runner is technically safe if he's carrying the base.
While it wouldn't really be fair to Acuña to call it a literal steal of second base, obviously, we were all thinking it.
“I thought he was just going to score with it in his hands,” Braves second baseman Ozzie Albies said.
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Despite his best efforts -- and even with the added perspective of Padres shortstop Xander Bogaerts -- a member of the Truist Park grounds crew had to be summoned to reinstall the base, which, almost assuredly, was not what they had been expecting when they drove to work today.
It is refreshing to find at least one thing on a baseball field that Acuña can't do.