"I just met Dickie Thon the other," Baker recalled after the Astros 5-2 loss to the Dodgers Tuesday night at Minute Maid Park. "I remember that's what ruined Dickie Thon's career. Dickie Thon got hit in the eye and he was never the same."
In 1983, att 25 years old, Thon was selected to the National League All Star team as a member of the Astros. He hit 20 home runs and stole 34 bases, finishing 7th in MVP voting, but on April 8 of the next he was hit in the face by a Mike Torrez fastball. The pitchin broke his orbital bone. He missed the rest of the season, and though he played 10 more Major League seasons he never made another all star team and only hit double-digit home runs once.
"You don't throw at a guy's head. that's dirty baseball, Baker said."
Kelly claims he didn't try to hit the Astros star.
“It was a ball," he said. "It wasn’t my best pitch. It’s never good to put a guy on (base). I wasn’t feeling the greatest. Took me a while to get into my mechanics.”
Baker isn't buying that.
"Balls get away sometimes, but not that many in the big leagues."
Bregman went hitless and committed two errors and declined to say if he thought Kelly threw at him, "I don't know if he was or he wasn't". He said he was angry, but not by anything Kelly did.
I'm angry that we lost the game to be honest with you. We didn't play our best game tonight, myself included. We move onto the next pitch and worry about playing tomorrow and trying to win the game.
The Astros will play the Dodgers again Wednesday night at Minute Maid Park. The two teams will meet again in September at Dodger Stadium.