Please Rise And Remove Your Caps For Kevin Gausman’s Argument With The Umpire

Nothing hits you over the head quite like jingoism at the Olympics. But on Saturday at Yankee Stadium, there was an inspiring alternative on display. Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Kevin Gausman was thrown out of the game in the middle of the seventh inning during the start of “God Bless America” for complaining about umpire Laz Díaz, to umpire Laz Díaz. Blue Jays manager John Schneider extended the argument as he made sure to remove his hat; Díaz did, too.

That was odd enough, since the strike zone Gausman disliked was in a game in which he didn’t pitch—his teammate José Berríos was the recipient, though Gausman’s ire might have been spurred by a low strike three on fellow workplace expatriate George Springer to end the top of the seventh—but the fact that he chose that moment to air his grievances was a reminder that for the most part, the national anthem and its ancillary relatives are not really part of the sporting experience. Gausman has probably heard “God Bless America” or “The Star-Spangled Banner” close to 2,500 times in his life; whatever special place it may hold in his heart has been beaten down by repetition. And let’s be honest: America’s been getting blessed at least 81 times a year at Yankee Stadium, to no visible effect.

Perhaps Gausman considered airing out Díaz to be his own patriotic duty, seeing as how he plays for a Canadian team and he was defending the honor and stat line of a native of Puerto Rico, which while technically a part of the U.S. is really its own cultural territory. The Blue Jays pitcher had something of a point: Díaz didn’t have a good afternoon for either the Jays or Yankees, who won 8-3, and his stat line was the worst of the 15 umpires on Saturday, but he nailed the second-inning intentional walk to Aaron Judge with two outs and no runners on. Maybe that was because he wasn’t distracted by a rendition of “America the Beautiful.”