Dan Jennings' 69-mph pitch to Adrian Gonzalez resulted in a staring contest
A reaction to an uncommon pitch is often worth a thousand words. One of our favorites was
In the top of the fifth inning, in the first pitch of his at-bat,
As you can see, once the ball crossed the plate and the umpire called a strike, Gonzalez couldn't do anything but stare at the official -- and it turns out, the pitch was a bit of an accident.
According to MLB.com's Adam McCalvy, Jennings tried not to laugh about it.
"Somebody yelled 'step off!' I think the runner was dancing off [first base]," said Jennings. "It was right as I was lifting my leg, so rather than balk, I decided I would rather take a 1-0 count. It didn't really work out that way. I looked back at
What was going through Gonzalez's mind while all of this was going down? Was he as shocked as we were? Perhaps.
In any case, it's always important to maintain eye contact -- those are just good manners.