Royals pitcher drilled in head with terrifying 107 mph liner, and the batter who hit it pulled a rare move
Kansas City Royals pitcher Seth Lugo exited Wednesday's game after taking a 107 mph liner off his head in another one of those "hold-your-breath" scenes out of Major League Baseball.
I feel like we get about five of these a year, and they're all tough to watch. Frankly, I'm surprised it doesn't happen more often. I've always been surprised by that. I played baseball for 15 years at every single level, and I NEVER saw a pitcher take a line drive off the head.
Again, I feel like it should happen way more often than it does, but I'm thankful it's seemingly rare.
Anyway, back to Lugo ...
Brandon Nimmo hit a scorcher off his face Wednesday night in Kansas City, and Lugo immediately hit the deck. Nimmo, who was teammates with Lugo with the Mets, was visibly shaken up while running to first base. He can be seen throwing his helmet off and waving his arms after Lugo went down.
After touching the bag, Nimmo immediately called time and ran over to his former teammate on the mound in one of the classier moves of the season.
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Goodness gracious. Scary stuff. It's amazing that Lugo got up as quickly as he did. And how about that WELT on his head?
I didn't know welts could form that quickly. That has to be some sort of record in terms of welt formation. That thing was MASSIVE after three seconds.
Good on Nimmo for immediately running over to check on his former teammate, too.
Not sure I've ever seen that, either. The batter just running to the mound right after touching first base? Shows you the respect he has for Lugo.
It also shows you what sort of dude Brandon Nimmo is. The veteran has a reputation of being one of the best guys in all of Major League Baseball, and I believe it after seeing that.
Anyway, all is well that ends well. Scary scene, but Lugo (somehow) walked away unscathed. The Royals later said he was "doing well," but would put him through the proper protocols before his next outing. His CT scan Wednesday night came back clear.
"He was shaken up pretty good," Lugo said of Nimmo's reaction. "I was really just trying to calm him down. ‘I’m OK, Nimms.’ He’s always been a sweetheart like that. As a buddy of mine, I felt for him. You’ve hit guys before as a pitcher, and you feel bad. So that was just an unfortunate situation, but everything’s OK."