Max Scherzer Breaks His Nose While Bunting, During Practice, For Crying Out Loud

Bunting is cool! It’s cool to surprise an infield. It’s cool to humiliate a shifted defense. It’s cool to make a noble sacrifice to advance a teammate. It’s cool to drive dipshit purists insane by bunting your way on to break up a lousy combined no-hitter. Possibly nothing in baseball is cooler than a successful . Know what’s not cool at all? When your ace smashes his face while bunting, during batting practice.

Jesse Dougherty of the says Scherzer suffered a broken nose on the play, but that a CT scan “revealed no further neurological damage.” Scherzer was scheduled to pitch against the Philadelphia Phillies on Wednesday; in the hours since the stupid, ridiculous, infuriating injury, the Nationals have called up 26-year-old pitcher Austin Voth from Triple-A Fresno, and he is reportedly expected to pitch for Scherzer. National League pitchers obviously have to practice this stuff, but is it really too much to ask that they wear a football helmet with Justin Tuck’s badass facemask on it when they do?