Colorado Rockies: Combat At Coors: Inside the bench-clearing brawl between Colorado and San Diego

DENVER – When does an action justify a reaction?

For the San Diego Padres, who happen to play baseball but did not play much of it on Wednesday, their magic count for an action to justify a reaction is three.

Padres bench coach Mark McGwire grabbed Rockies third baseman Nolan Arenado by the gullet with his right hand and held up his left hand with three outstretched fingers.

Whilst yelling McGwire was referencing three instances, a magic amount in baseball. The tally it takes to send a batter packing, if you do that three times then you get to hit. McGwire’s three was in reference to the amount of players the Padres felt the Arenado-led Rockies have hit over the past week.

The Rockies and Padres are in the midst of playing 10 games within the first month of the season. In the clubs’ first meeting, veteran San Deigo catcher A.J. Ellis was plunked by the veteran Chad Bettis, and it was unintentional. A day later, Padres’ rookie third baseman Christian Villanueva was hit by Rockies’ reliever Scott Oberg between smashing his second and third home runs in a slugging assault.

Now, this may have been the first strike in McGwire’s book… or it wasn’t because Villanueva scored the go-ahead run later in the inning. Either way, the evidence can point you to a conclusion for whichever team you favor.

In the third matchup—still in San Deigo, just a day later again—Rockies ace Jon Gray plunked Padres fifth-year outfielder Jose Pirela in the middle innings of a five-run game. The finale of the four-gamer saw no beanballs.

Three days against other opponents and then the teams were in Denver. The first night and fifth matchup in eight days saw no bad blood. In matchup six, the blood was spit from Manuel Margot’s mouth as he lied in excessive pain as an ear whistling 95 mph fastball from Oberg bruised his ribs. One Rockie said off the record that he understood why they were upset, their guy was spitting blood and is now on the DL.

Oberg said he by no means meant that intentionally, going as far to text Margot an apology.

For McGwire, this was strike two.

On Wednesday, in their seventh matchup in little more than a week, tensions exploded into a full-blown brouhaha.

Trevor Story was beaned with two outs in the first inning by Padres starter Luis Perdomo. The Rockies matched in the next half frame, as starter German Marquez tagged Hunter Renfroe. Again with two outs.

Strike three.

There was no waiting in the bottom half of the third. The Padres promptly plunked Arenado. Perdomo unleashed his hardest fastball—96—behind the back of the superstar.

In McGwire’s world, he views the three separate Rockies actions as deliberate, in the sinister matter of risking his player’s health. To him, manager Andy Green and Perdomo that justifies the reaction gunning for Arenado.

In Arenado’s world, the belligerent act in itself was enough to justify a reaction.

“I thought they wanted to do something and I had to do something too,” he said. “I had a feeling they might do that to someone, I didn’t know it would be me.”

He charged the mound to inflict some of the same harm that Perdomo had intended for him.

Arenado skipped in vengeance, Perdomo’s glove flew to protect himself.

Arenado threw a blistering right-handed hook that grazed the occiput of the fleeing Perdomo.

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The benches cleared. Some came out to protect teammates, others to cause harm to rivals; if necessary.

“I was in the on-deck circle, by the time I reached the mound I was surrounded by Padres, my one concern was trying to protect him (Arenado) the whole time,” Rockies outfielder Carlos Gonzalez said. “Even if you have to take or throw or a few punches I was out there for my teammate.”

On the other side, so too was Ellis.

“As I was trying to be a peacemaker and put that to an end, some of their players took offense to my attempt to create peace,” A.J. Ellis told Dennis Lin The Athletic. “Apparently, I’m not Switzerland.”

Ellis felt blindsided by fiery Colorado outfielder Gerardo Parra.

“I protect my team, even more for our best player,” Parra said. “Nolan’s our best one.”

Parra was seen jumping over the shoves and eventually connected on a left-handed jab to Ellis’ jaw.

Ellis was barely held back as Ian Desmond hugged his chest and anchored his belt.

Arenado was lost on the southern front where Gonzalez held him.

“I pushed him back and Mark (McGwire) approached him,” CarGo said.” There was a back and forth. He said we hit a couple of guys and ‘what do you expect of course we were going to send a message.'”

That’s when the All-Star McGwire viciously held up those three fingers in the face of the All-Star Arenado.

For Major League Baseball, every action taken by Arenado, Parra, Marquez justifies the reaction of a suspension. Or, at least that’s what the three players assume.

What we learned in the Padres-Rockies brawl is how far a player will go to protect a teammate or himself. Sometimes actions cross lines that force the ire via a reaction from the opposition. And, that boys—well—they’ll be boys.

“We all react differently,” CarGo said.

The Rockies bats reacted by awakening for the first time in days, crossing six en route to winning just the second game in the finale of a six-game homestand.

The Padres are back in Denver in 11 days.

Next: Watch the Brawl

“We’ll see (if it’s over,)” said a still heated Arenado.