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St. Louis Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said he warned the Milwaukee Brewers about relaying signs from the dugout during Tuesday night’s game, a situation that came to a head when Milwaukee reliever Abner Uribe gestured toward the St. Louis dugout with three WWE-style crotch chops after an inning-ending eighth strikeout.
Uribe, speaking through an interpreter, said after the game that he believed Marmol had made signs he believed were intended to instruct Cardinals pitchers to hit Brewers batters with pitches, particularly outfielder Christian Yelich and catcher William Contreras.
Speaking to reporters before a Wednesday afternoon game between the teams, Marmol initially said he did not have a reaction to Uribe’s accusations.
“I’d rather not blow anything out of proportion,” Marmol said. “I think it already has been, to be perfectly honest with you.”
When pressed further on the matter, he replied.
“I have no problem telling you the whole story, but I just think that, like everything else these days, it gets blown up. It’s like an everyday occurrence,” Marmol said. “We felt like it [the Brewers] were quite demonstrative in relaying signs from the grave.”
Marmol said that’s when he mouthed and gestured to the Brewer’s dugout.
“I looked over and I said, ‘Hey, you gotta do it, be smart, you’re gonna get hurt,'” Marmol said, pointing to his ribs. “Like, ‘What are we trying to do here?’ That was it.”
Marmol said there was also an incident involving an unnamed Brewers trainer before the game regarding the sign relay issue. The same coach and Marmol spoke after the game, according to Marmol, who said he had no discussions with Brewers manager Pat Murphy, who condemned Uribe’s antics, calling it “unacceptable.”
When asked if the matter had been settled, Marmol said, “I have no reason to believe it isn’t. You just don’t usually get the type of demonstrative reactions that spur further questions. That’s just the reality of it. But we have that kind of interaction daily across the league.”
Yelich, speaking in the Brewers’ clubhouse on Wednesday, described Uribe’s gesture as “a little bit over the top.”
“Obviously, I don’t think the strike celebration is something we should do,” Yelich said. “He’s a guy who always has his teammates’ backs. I appreciate where he was coming from, but I think there’s another way to handle that situation, and he knows that.”
Yelich also said that there have been “some things over the course of the series that I don’t really know why they happened,” but declined to elaborate.
Yelich said the Brewers didn’t want the case to distract from their performance on the field. Milwaukee has taken the first two games of the series.
“We’ve all addressed it and we’re going to move forward and make it not be a big distraction,” he said.
Report from the Associated Press.
