What unfolded in front of 13,330 people during the Miami Marlins and Kansas City Royals game was not exactly a surprise. Back on April 18, Matt Quatraro wanted to check whether Will Warren was committing a balk in the first inning. So he did what he had to do and asked second-base umpire Nestor Ceja. What followed was an ejection. Sure, Quatraro said he “actually wasn’t arguing,” but the visuals showed otherwise. Now, multiply that by some, and you get what happened against the Marlins.

“Royals manager Matt Quatraro gets himself ejected after umpires rescinded a balk given to the Marlins,” Jomboy Media captioned the clip on X. 

The Royals were trailing 3-0 before the seventh at Kauffman Stadium, thanks in large part to Miami starter Tyler Phillips, who allowed just one hit over five innings. But the hosts finally found their footing in the eighth.

Jensen doubled, allowing Josh Rojas to score. Then, Bobby Witt Jr’s sacrifice fly sent Isaac Collins home and moved Jensen to third. Jac Caglianone came to the plate and took a pitch. Then came the unusual action from Victor Vodnik.

The Marlins reliever was preparing to throw a 1-0 pitch, but he decided to step off the rubber. However, before he could, his right cleat touched the rubber, causing him to stumble slightly.

Vodnik turned around and stepped off the mound to reset. But first-base umpire Nestor Ceja called a balk.

Jensen advanced to home plate, but since the pitcher never threw the ball, the call created some confusion for him and his teammates. Marlins manager Clayton McCullough stepped out of the dugout to ask for an explanation, and the umpires gathered to discuss the call.

The result, you may ask?

The call was overturned, and crew chief Chris Guccione signaled Jensen to get back on third. 

“It looked strange on the field when it happened,” Guccione told reporters after the game. “So I wanted to get the crew together to make sure that what we saw was correct and if we needed to change anything. After we got together as a crew, we realized a couple of things. He was trying to make a proper disengagement, which we felt like he did, even though his cleat caught on the rubber, which made him kind of stumble. That was another factor.”

The other factor was the pitcher having some issues with the PitchCom.

So the umpires wanted to fix it before the next pitch, but their ruling didn’t have the best impact on the Royals’ manager. 

Matt Quatraro explains what sparked his frustration

“It’s hard to get balks called,” Quatraro explained postgame. “It’s not a common thing. And then to see it overturned, I think my frustration was more just that it seemed like they were looking for a reason to overturn it when that call doesn’t usually come from second base or home plate, just because of the nature of the balk itself.”

But his biggest frustration was where they stood at that point in the game.

A balk would have made it 6-3 in favor of the Marlins. Instead, the overturned call left Kansas City trailing by four runs.

“I actually wasn’t arguing,” the manager added. “I was just trying to get some clarification. We’ve been told that if the pitcher’s on the rubber, he’s about to start and then he goes to touch the PitchCom, it should be a balk because it’s essentially doing starting and stopping twice.”

Although he claimed that he wasn’t there to argue, it looked like one of the most heated confrontations between Quatraro and Guccione. The crew chief had explained the decision. But the skipper was not looking to back down, and the umpire had to toss him. 

But was it really a balk? Well, Quatraro thinks it probably wasn’t. 

“[Vodnik] was trying to step off and got his cleat caught,” Quatraro noted. “But sometimes your intention isn’t what ends up being what matters, right? Sometimes you either do or you don’t, and the call was made.”

Despite his acknowledgement, Quatraro joins a long list of frustrated managers who got ejected over a balk call.

Walt Weiss, the Atlanta Braves skipper, was tossed after arguing a run-scoring balk on Chris Sale earlier in August. Chicago Cubs’ Craig Counsell suffered a similar fate a few weeks later, on his birthday. 

The Royals eventually got their third run in the ninth, but it was a little too late to recover from the deficit.

They suffered a 6-3 loss in the series opener against the Marlins. Interestingly, they were on a hot streak earlier with a 12-2 record. However, that hardly helped their position, as they are still fifth in the AL Central with a 62-77 record. The overturned balk call and the lost momentum only add to their disappointment.