If you are a Mariners fan, there’s a strong chance someone in your life has recently sent you a reel by the comic Jordan Jensen in which Jensen tells a story about being at the Sunday August 13th Yankees game and seeing Julio Rodríguez throw a ball into the stands and allegedly kill a pigeon. If you haven’t seen the reel yet, it’s worth a watch; you can see it, titled “The Perfect Throw” here.
As I watched the reel, my first thought – as I’m sure it was for many of you – was absolutely no way. It’s too good a story, too neat a parallel to the infamous Randy Johnson dead dove incident, and most importantly, too much Mariners as central character. Surely this was exaggerated for the bit. So because I am a Serious Journalist, I asked Julio about it, just hours after the reel was distributed to Jensen’s 822 thousand followers on Instagram.
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Julio, who hadn’t seen the reel yet, watched through it with me, rolling his eyes at Jensen’s lengthy discussion of what a “Mariner” actually is (“that’s not funny”), but appreciative of the way Jensen characterized his throw and interaction with the crowd (“Of course I throw a ball to the kids. Of course I do that.”). But when we hit the actual part of the story with the pigeon, Julio had some corrections.
The first point of contention: the death of the pigeon.
“No way,” said Julio immediately at that part of the video. “No, no, no. No way.”
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According to Julio, the ball did strike the pigeon—one of a flock circling around the outfield hoping to scavenge a snack in the late innings of a day game—and the pigeon fell, but it was concussed, not dead, and certainly not obliterated in a Randy Johnson-style poof of feathers.
Mariners bullpen catcher Justin Novak, who was in the bullpen at the time, backs up Julio’s story, saying the grounds crew came and picked up the pigeon and deposited it in a shaded spot in the Mariners bullpen, under an overhanging bit of wall, where the bird could let the shock wear off. It remained there through the end of the game, with members of the bullpen checking in on it occasionally.
“It was just sitting there like, bro, what?” says Novak.
“But as far as we know, that pigeon is fine.”
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However, both Julio and Novak say the part about the crowd chanting “pigeon killer” at Rodríguez is accurate, and backed up by film. You can see him being playful with the crowd in the next inning after a routine flyout from Trent Grisham, the only ball that would reach him in the outfield for the rest of the afternoon:
“They were shouting ‘pigeon killer!’ said Novak. “And like, ‘we love pigeons!'”, proving the biggest liars in this story are the Yankees fans themselves.
So no, Julio Rodríguez did not kill a pigeon. However, this shouldn’t stop you from modernizing one of the greatest couples costumes of all time and going as Julio and the Pigeon this Halloween.
Read the full article here
