This Is The Showboatingest Homer I've Ever Seen

We have an extremely good controversy out of Southern Ontario’s Intercounty Baseball League, where the Barrie Baycats took down the Kitchener Panthers last week in a six-game series for their fifth straight championship.

And in that deciding Game 6, a “former St. Louis Cardinals prospect” named Starlin Rodriguez hit a two-run tie-breaking dinger in the seventh inning, following up his mighty swing with some extremely flamboyant showboating.

I count four different badass actions from Rodriguez on this tater. 1) He pimps it forever. 2) The towering batflip. 3) A home run trot that takes approximately 44 seconds.* And 4) The confident shove of the catcher blocking the basepath at the end.

Even though this was undoubtedly the most important dinger of the IBL season, and deserving of celebration, the keepers of baseball civility were naturally quick to voice their displeasure. Aside from the audible guy on the video whining, “Seriously?” the Panthers also threw behind the next batter, and manager Luke Baker offered this scolding after the game:

“As far as I’m concerned, in the middle of the game, it’s completely unnecessary,” said Baker. “It’s one of those unwritten rules you just don’t do.”

Bullshit! This game was for the Jack and Lynne Dominico Cup, and it’s not time for modesty when your swing just put your team in the lead. Starlin Rodriguez should continue to be ostentatious as hell, and everyone in the big leagues needs to learn from his example.

*Update (8:00 p.m.): Reader Trevor wrote in and said that he was at the game, and the slow trot was due to Rodriguez pulling his groin earlier in the night. It’s still badass, though.

Correction (9:56 a.m. 9/13): The article originally stated, based on other reports, that Rodriguez was ejected following the homer. In an email, the Baycats clarified that he was actually just taken out of the game due to his groin injury.