LLWS: Gotta Love Seeing Mets, Phillies Post-Game Handshake

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On Sunday evening, the New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies played in the second annual MLB Little League Classic. After the game, the two MLB teams did something unseen by the pros: shake hands.

For whatever reason, once you become a professional baseball player, the post-game handshakes stop. In college baseball, you shake hands after the game. High school? Same thing. A lot of time, you even see NBA and NFL players shaking hands immediately after games, although these are not formal.

On Sunday, however, for the second consecutive season, two MLB teams lined up after a game to shake hands. Last season in the first MLB Little League Classic, the Pittsburgh Pirates and St. Louis Cardinals shook hands. This year, it was the Philadelphia Phillies and New York Mets engaging in the forgotten ritual.

While it was cool to see it happen on Sunday in front of hundreds of current Little Leaguers, don’t expect it t0 start happening regularly.

Per an ESPN report in 2017, Cardinals’ pitcher Adam Wainwright explained why:

“If there was postgame handshakes, you’d see some fights out there.”

It sucks to hear but he’s probably right. Like, what if they had a bench-clearing brawl earlier in the game? Or what if some knucklehead ran his mouth at someone from the other team? Most high school and college games aren’t televised. MLB games, on the other hand, are ALWAYS on television. The league, for sure, doesn’t want that mess.

For the record, seeing five or six post-game handshake fights per year would be great for social media and for baseball’s popularity. Still, they’re too old school.

In the game, the Mets won 8-2 behind a strong performance from Jason Vargas and 14 hits. Phillies’ slugger Carlos Santana hit the only home run of the game.

Last year, the Pirates beat the Cardinals by a 6-3 score.

CATEGORY: MLB