Giants’ Heliot Ramos robbed of home run by Tropicana Field catwalk
It looked like a home run. Sounded like a home run. Heliot Ramos thought it was gone . So did the Giants’ broadcasters. Somehow, it landed in Cedric Mullins ’ glove, leaving Ramos slack jawed and leading to two ejections from the visitors’ dugout.
Even home runs off the bat aren’t getting over the wall these days for the Giants, who haven’t hit one since they left San Francisco six days ago.
Ramos appeared to connect on their first dinger of their road trip in the second inning Saturday against Rays opener Griffin Jax . He squared up a 3-2 fastball to straightaway center field, sending Mullins back to the warning track.
The center fielder either deked everyone in the building or something else led to him making a late adjustment on his read of the fly ball, which left Ramos’ bat at 107.9 mph on a 33-degree trajectory.
Eight other fly balls with near-identical matches to Ramos’ have been hit inside Tropicana Field since Statcast began tracking batted-ball data in 2015. Every one was a home run.
Not this swing. Mullins retreated, touched the wall and suddenly came in to make the catch.
Ramos, who had made it to second base, looked stunned. He appeared to remark, “There’s no way,” on his way back to the dugout. On the Giants’ television broadcast, play-by-play man Dave Flemming had broken into a home-run call and was left equally confused.
The catwalks can come into play on high fly balls at Tropicana Field. According to the ground rules, if a ball in fair play comes into contact with one of the two lower rings, it is automatically ruled a home run. If it hits the two higher catwalks, it is considered a live ball.
However, when the Giants requested a video review, there were apparently no angles available showing the catwalks interfering with the flight of the ball. The call on the field of a catch stood.
That led to more drama, with manager Tony Vitello going back and forth with home plate umpire Hunter Wendelstedt and crew chief Vic Carapazza tossing director of pitching Frank Anderson and right-hander Adrian Houser from the game.
There are no shortage of reasons for frustration in the San Francisco dugout.
The last home run the Giants hit came almost a week ago, off the bat of Casey Schmitt in what was also the last game they won, Sunday at home against the Marlins . They remain the last team in the league yet to hit 20 total and have scored the fewest runs in the majors.
When they finally pushed across a run in the sixth inning, on a pair of doubles from Rafael Devers and Luis Arraez , it was the first time they had scored since they tied an eventual walkoff loss Thursday against the Phillies — 16 innings prior.
