After vehemently arguing the call at the plate that helped decide Wednesday night’s game between the Mets and the Cubs — when Pete Alonso was ruled out at the plate despite the Mets’ contention that catcher Miguel Amaya was illegally blocking the plate — Carlos Mendoza was ready to move on prior to Thursday’s game at Citi Field.
Instead, Mendoza credited the Cubs — and third baseman Nick Madrigal, in particular — for executing a perfect relay to home from left field on Jeff McNeil’s fly ball to left fielder Ian Happ.
And after replay review upheld the ruling after Wednesday night’s game, an industry source said Thursday that Mendoza’s argument that a catcher can’t have his foot on any part of home plate was true until this season, but following a controversial play last year in which Texas catcher Jonah Heim was called for blocking the plate on a play in which the runner still had a path to the plate, a change was made.
Starting this year, an illegal setup needs to impede a runner from scoring in order for a violation to be called and, as the rule states, an illegal setup can be nullified if the final movements are in reaction to the trajectory of the throw.
Since Alonso still had an opportunity to get to the plate, even with Amaya’s foot on the back half of it, the no blocking call stood and ended the Cubs’ 1-0 win.