Maybe in some parallel universe, mild-mannered pitcher Ubaldo Jimenez would throw at an opposing hitter while he's pitching a no-hitter. Mind you, it was very early in a possible no-hitter, but you have to think that Jimenez would be too concerned with continuing his comeback from his disappointing 2014 season to endanger a close game by hitting Pablo Sandoval for no apparent reason.
Umpire Jordan Baker, only a couple of weeks into his second year as a full-time major league umpire, obviously lives in that parallel universe, because he read Jimenez's mind and decided in an instant that the pitch was on purpose and it was appropriate to disrupt the entire four-game series between the Orioles and Red Sox by throwing him out of the game.
Not only did Jimenez, who is known for his faulty mechanics and control, get ejected from the game because of a possibly clairvoyant umpire, but he got thrown out so early in the game that the Orioles had to burn four relievers in the first game of a four-game series and an uninterrupted seven-game road trip.
According to Buck Showalter, Baker told him that he decided the pitch was intentional because Sandoval slid hard into Jonathan Schoop earlier in the game. That's possible, I guess, but a takeout slide to prevent a double play is Fundamental Baseball 101, so it's hard to imagine the Orioles being all that upset about it. They would do the same thing in the same situation and Showalter said as much during a post-game interview.
He called the ruling "professionally embarrassing," and said he hoped Baker would be reprimanded by Major League Baseball.
Good luck with that. It's more likely that Showalter will be reprimanded and fined for giving the young umpire an earful and criticizing him publicly.
Baseball's funny that way.