Umpire gets absolutely drilled by relay throw

One umpire incident seemingly wasn’t enough for the Yankees-Guardians game on Wednesday, so naturally, another one had to take place.

In the top of the fifth inning of Wednesday afternoon’s game, Yankees catcher Kyle Higashioka drilled a double off the center field wall. While one run already scored, Guardians second baseman Andrés Giménez relayed the throw home to prevent Isiah Kiner-Falefa from scoring from first. Instead, the ball ended up striking the second base umpire, Larry Vanover, directly in the head and the ricochet allowed Kiner-Falefa to score, while Giménez was charged with an error.

Vanover was unable to get out of the way of the relay throw and was subsequently knocked off his feet, as his baseball cap blew off his head. Fournatley, the 67-year-old Vanover was able to leave the game under his own power, but ultimately his head paid the price.

The MLB world reacted to yet another umpire incident taking place in Wednesday’s game:

“Boone gave that umpire an ear full — and so did Giménez,” wrote The Athletic’s Brendan Kuty.

“OH MY GOD I JUST WANTED THE UMPIRE SUSPENDED NOT HIT IN THE HEAD,” said Jimmy Randazzo.

“Been a rough start to the season for umpire Larry Vanover. Messed up a ‘delay of game’ call in a Mets game, made a mess of the challenge/replay in the Yankees game and now been plunked in the head by a relay throw,” tweeted Jamie Steed.

“Guardians’ 2B Andres Gimenez has been charged with an error for the throw that hit umpire Larry Vanover, which is utter BS,” wrote High Heat Stats. “Umpires are part of the field, and this is not the player’s fault. It should be a regular play and the run should be earned.”

“Umpire Larry Vanover has been removed from the game. Let’s give this dude credit. He simply eat this,” said Mike Daddino.

[Talkin Yanks on Twitter]