‘He needs to practice more’: Terry Francona rips umpire who missed tag call

Guardians manager Terry Francona argues with home plate umpire Bruce Dreckman during fourth inning Friday at Progressive Field. Francona, who was ejected from the game, was arguing a call where Guardians shortstop Brayan Rocchio (6) was called out at second base on a review.David Petkiewicz, cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — An infielder cannot intentionally push a base runner’s hand off the bag and have the runner called out, but that was not the case Friday for Guardians rookie Brayan Rocchio. The call missed by umpire Malachi Moore in the fourth inning led to Cleveland manager Terry Francona being ejected in a 4-2 win against the White Sox, and prompted Francona to rip Moore in his postgame comments to reporters.

After the game, Francona appeared just as upset about the missed call as he was irate over Moore’s response to the protest.

“When you make a call that hideous, you can’t be arrogant, you can’t be throwing your hands up in the air,” Francona said. “He was two feet from there. He needs to practice more.”

Moore, one of 10 umpires promoted to full-time MLB status for the 2023 season, had rotated over from his third base position on Rocchio’s line drive hit to right. As Rocchio slid over the bag, Chicago shortstop Tim Anderson applied a tag, and video showed Anderson intentionally push Rocchio’s hand away.

Moore correctly ruled Rocchio safe in the moment, but did not go a step further and call the play dead after Anderson’s intentional act. Had Moore done that, replay officials would not have been able to overturn the safe call when White Sox manager Pedro Grifol challenged. Officials in New York had no choice but to call Rocchio out, prompting Francona to emerge from Cleveland’s dugout in protest.

Terry Francona has been ejected in the 4th inning after disputing an overturned call at second base.#ForTheLand pic.twitter.com/USTo0NCaJK

After a couple of minutes arguing with crew chief Mark Wegner and home plate umpire Bruce Dreckman, Francona turned and started back toward Cleveland’s dugout. But he only got about three steps away from Dreckman before barking in the direction of Moore.

“When they overturned it, Bruce kind of explained it to me, and as I’m going back I just yelled at Malachi,” Francona said. “I said, ‘You’ve got to get that right.’”

That’s when Dreckman intervened and tossed Francona, who got his money’s worth after a few minutes of letting Moore know exactly what was on his mind.

It was the second ejection of the season for Francona and the 49th of his managerial career. His earlier ejection came on July 29 in Chicago when he was tossed for arguing that he had signaled for a replay review, but the gesture was not acknowledged by umpire Todd Tichenor.

Ironically, Francona insisted on Friday that Grifol had run out of time before he challenged the call on Rocchio’s slide.

”I thought they gave him too much time, way too much time,” Francona said. “That’s why I thought (Dreckman) was going over to their dugout, to tell him you can’t challenge.”