Craig Kimbrel was called on Saturday for the first time since complaining of discomfort in his shoulder last Monday. The appearance did not go smoothly.
Kimbrel hit Mets outfielder Eric Young Jr. with a one-out pitch, yielded a single to Daniel Murphy, a double to David Wright, a two-out single to Chris Young, and then walked Lucas Duda. Atlanta’s ninth-inning lead had shrunk from 7-3 to 7-5, and after the free pass to Duda manager Fredi Gonzalez decided to pull his struggling closer, who had thrown 24 pitches.
Kimbrel was visibly upset as Gonzalez stepped out of the dugout and appeared to express that directly to the skipper as he moved toward the mound. Jordan Walden came on and neeedd just three pitches to pick up the save, which left Kimbrel feeling bad about the way he acted toward Gonzalez after the game.
MLB.com has a good video mashup of the pitching change and Kimbrel’s postgame interview:
[mlbvideo id=”32228505″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]