Cal Quantrill Starts Benches-Clearing Brawl With Extremely Specific And Informed Trash Talk

Keep your Subway Series, your Crosstown Classic. Benches cleared in the fourth inning of Wednesday afternoon's much-awaited Red Sox-Rockies clash. The Red Sox trailed the Rockies 8-1 before they finally showed signs of life, leading off the top of the fourth with a single and a double against Rockies starter Cal Quantrill. Quantrill, who was designated for assignment by Cleveland and traded to the Rockies this offseason, has fared surprisingly well at Coors Field. With runners on second and third, Quantrill gave up a run on an RBI groundout from Dominic Smith, but struck out Romy González for the second out and then got catcher Reese McGuire to pop up to end the inning.

If it seems silly to celebrate preserving a six-run lead, keep in mind that Quantrill pitches for the Rockies. The starter didn't need to turn around to know that he'd induced a weak fly ball from McGuire, and he let out a triumphant scream as he walked back to the dugout. McGuire, still jogging down the first-base line, snapped at him. “I recognize we were up by whatever we were up by, but I celebrate when I get important outs,” Quantrill told reporters afterward in the locker room. “He took offense to it. Some words were exchanged. It’s baseball. We’ll all move on.”

Quantrill does celebrate when he gets important outs, and the Red Sox know it. Three years ago, when Quantrill still pitched for the Guardians, he screamed after striking out Rafael Devers to end the sixth inning of a tie game. Devers stood there puzzled as Quantrill stalked off the mound. (He would get his revenge the next time they met, in 2022, when Devers took Quantrill deep in Cleveland.)

“Words were exchanged” doesn't quite do Quantrill justice, though. In the home-plate angle of the incident, you can make out McGuire saying something to Quantrill and lip-read Quantrill immediately replying, “You jacked off in a fucking parking lot, you dumb fuck!” McGuire was, indeed, arrested and charged with “exposure of sexual organs” in February of 2020, when he played for the Blue Jays. At the time, deputies said they responded to a call that a man was exposing himself in the parking lot of a strip mall in Dunedin, Fla., where the Jays hold their spring training. “If you're down at an apartment next to the stadium, why would you come to a parking lot just to masturbate?” a deputy asked McGuire in footage of the arrest obtained by TMZ. “I just—I don't know,” McGuire responded. (McGuire, TMZ reported, pleaded no contest to a second-degree misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct.)

Quantrill finished his outing having logged a quality start, and in line for the win—the Rockies would go on to tie a franchise run-scoring record in their 20-7 beatdown. But what really stands out in retrospect is his lightning-fast recall of the details of a mortifying moment that happened more than four years ago. Pitchers and catchers consider swing tendencies and first-pitch aggression when they scout opposing hitters. But do they brush up on the most embarrassing moments of their opponents lives as well? Perhaps what had been presumed to be baseball-only chatter during mound visits goes more like: “Let’s start heater low and away. Called his teacher ‘Mom’ once and started singing during a Zoom meeting when he thought he was muted.”