After a close play at second base, Jason Kipnis was ready to protect himself from Rougned Odor
It's not often that a team that just hit into a double play ends up laughing, but
After holding the pose for a second, Kipnis ran off the field, a smile on his face. And then the Rangers dugout broke out with more laughter than your standard live sitcom taping where you're literally required to laugh.
Kipnis told MLB.com's Jordan Bastian after the game that it was a spur of the moment decision.
"That wasn't planned at all. It just came to me," the second baseman said. "I was just goofing around with him. It wasn't a dirty slide from him at all. It was a slow-developing grounder, so I knew he was going to be right on top of me. It was a hard slide. That's the way I slide into second. I hope he never stops sliding hard into second. He's a good guy. His uncle was my Double-A hitting coach, so I've known about him coming up for a while. I hope he always plays hard."
The Rangers manager, Jeff Banisiter, enjoyed it too. "How fun was that moment? Look, I enjoyed that because I like how Kipnis plays. I like the edginess he plays with. He runs hard and reminds me of some of the guys we got on this club," he told MLB.com's Ryan Posner.
"For him to have a light moment in the game of baseball, where we can be very pompous about ourselves and we can be very reactive, to have a light moment with someone on the other team and then come make a statement on how much he respects [Odor] -- I respect him for making the comment and having fun with it."
