Patrick Kaple

Here’s the facts of this situation: 1) It was pouring rain and the mound was extremely wet. You could see 6 inch slash marks where my cleats were slipping every pitch. That’s what I was pointing to. 2) I asked for drying agent to be put on the mound so it was safe to pitch in the second inning. The umpire crew obliged and fixed the mound and I had no complaints in the second inning. 3) it started raining significantly harder in the third inning. By the time I took the mound for the third, the drying agent from the second was soaked. I calmly asked to have more drying agent applied because the mound was not safe to pitch on. 4) the umpire crew refused to put drying agent on the mound again. I asked my manager and pitching coach to help translate and told them it was not safe to pitch. They agreed and asked the crew to just apply drying agent again. The crew again refused. 5) I threw warmup pitches. I visibly slipped on multiple of them. I again said it was not safe to pitch. The umpires again refused to put drying agent on the mound and said we had to start the inning. 6) I threw 4 pitches. I slipped on every one. I nearly fell over on one because my foot slipped 6 inches. I had no idea where the ball was going because my feet were slipping all over the place. That is not safe for the hitter and that is not safe for me as the pitcher. I pleaded after every pitch to apply drying agent. The umpire refused. 7) after the fourth pitch I refused to throw any more pitches because I was not willing to tear a hamstring or groin or knee in those conditions. So finally the umpire crew asked the grounds crew to apply drying agent. At the same time, they correctly decided it was raining way too hard to continue playing so they pulled the tarp. 8) we had about 90 minutes of delay. When the grounds crew pulled the tarp off the field and looked at the mound, they said they needed 45 minutes just to get it in playable condition. So decide what you want about the situation, but those are the facts. And I have all of this in the vlog, which will be out in a couple of days, so everyone can hear for themselves what was going on.