Yankees fans pelt Guardians players with trash following NY walk-off win, face-to-face with Myles Straw

David Suggs

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Yankees fans pelt Guardians players with trash following NY walk-off win, face-to-face with Myles Straw image

Game 2 of the Yankees-Guardians weekend series had a frantic ending Saturday afternoon. 

The Guardians were leading by a run in the bottom of the ninth inning with a runner on and two outs when the Yankees' Isiah Kiner-Falefa smacked a line drive toward the left-field wall. Guardians rookie outfielder Steven Kwan darted to the wall, hoping to come up with an acrobatic game-ending catch.

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Kwan was too late, though, and as the ball ricocheted off the fence, so, too, did Kwan. He appeared to bump his head into the fence and keeled over after throwing the ball into the infield.

As Kwan was being examined by team medical personnel, some fans had words for him, according to Guardians manager Terry Francona and center fielder Myles Straw. That seemed to set off Straw and right fielder Oscar Mercado — Straw scaled the fence to confront some of the Bleacher Creatures.

There was still a game to be played, though. Kiner-Falefa's double drove in pinch runner Tim Locastro to tie the game. Gleyber Torres then came to the plate with a chance to be the hero.

And he was just that; he lined a ball over Mercado's head to drive in Kiner-Falefa and give the Yanks a 5-4 walk-off win.

That's when things got really interesting. As soon as Torres' hit landed, fans immediately began pelting Straw and Mercado with trash. The Guardians players were rightfully miffed — Mercado was escorted away from the bleachers by his teammates while umpires tried to hold back other Guardians.

Yankees players were not pleased, either. Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton cut short their celebration, ran into the outfield and pleaded with fans to stop throwing objects. Not a pretty sight.

Straw said he was angry that fans were heckling Kwan while was still shaken up.

"Kwan is the nicest guy on the planet and that's my teammate, that's my brother, and some of the things that were said to him just, for me, wasn't going to fly, so my emotions got to me a little bit," Straw said. "But at that point I feel, like, as a Yankees fan you've got to be excited for your team. You should be cheering and you should never prey on a someone. Some guy went head first real hard into the wall. There's no business for saying the things those guys said to him.

"It got to me a little bit and I said what I said. If I were to do it again, I probably would have said the same thing. It's my guy, and at that point, just cheer. Be happy your team tied the game up and be a normal baseball fan and just enjoy what's going on."

Straw said he has "never seen anything like this anywhere else." 

Francona and New York manager Aaron Boone also took exception to the fans' behavior.

"Obviously, there's no place for throwing stuff on the field," Boone told reporters.

First pitch of Game 3 in the series is scheduled for 1:35 p.m. ET Sunday. It will be interesting to see if Yankees fans have additional words or gestures for Straw, Mercado and the rest of the Guardians.

David Suggs

David Suggs Photo

David Suggs is a content producer at The Sporting News. A long-suffering Everton, Wizards and Commanders fan, he has learned to get used to losing over the years. In his free time, he enjoys skateboarding (poorly), listening to the likes of Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye and D’Angelo, and penning short journal entries.