Mandatory Credit: Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports

Michael Kay Calls Out Baseball’s Dumbest Tradition

"I'm telling you, the run from the bullpen is one of the most ridiculous things"

Mandatory Credit: Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports

In the theater of baseball absurdity, few acts rival the majestic pointlessness of the bullpen clearing. The collective groan at 5:30 in Jomboy Media’s Yankees vs Royals ALDS watch-along tells the exact story of what everyone thinks of the bullpen running in: it’s stupid.

A minor disagreement erupts between players, words are exchanged, and suddenly, relief pitchers from both teams abandon their distant outfield habitats to embark on an epic journey across hundreds of feet of field, arriving breathless and ready for… absolutely nothing.

Yankees broadcaster Michael Kay recently put into words what baseball fans have silently thought for decades. During yet another pointless bench-clearing incident at Camden Yards between the Yankees and Orioles, Michael Kay wasn’t having it: “I’m telling you, the run from the bullpen is one of the most ridiculous things. No one’s thrown a punch. No one’s said a curse word. But they all had to run from the 410-foot mark.”

"I'm telling you, the run from the bullpen is one of the most ridiculous things. No one's thrown a punch. No one's said a curse word. But they all had to run from the 410-foot mark."

Michael Kay after the Yankees and Orioles had a brief bench-clearing incident. pic.twitter.com/SEAxV2a2ie
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) May 1, 2025

The scene that triggered Kay’s exasperation: In the bottom of the fourth inning during Baltimore’s 5-4 victory over New York, Orioles’ Heston Kjerstad slid into second base on a steal attempt as Yankees second baseman Pablo Reyes leaped to catch a high throw from catcher Austin Wells. This play escalated into another ceremonial gathering of grown men on a field.

This wasn’t even the first time in recent memory. That playoff incident sparked when Anthony Volpe tagged Royals’ Maikel Garcia during a double play attempt in Game 4 of the ALDS. Volpe’s tag caught Garcia in the throat, Garcia made a somewhat late slide, and baseball’s most predictable ritual commenced. Despite the supposedly heightened stakes of playoff baseball, the result was the same: bullpen pitchers running a quarter mile to participate in… standing around.

Kjerstad, on the other hand, has become something of an unintentional catalyst in triggering these events. On July 12, 2024, he was hit in the head by a pitch during a game at Camden Yards, leading to a more heated confrontation between the teams.

But even in the most “heated” of these incidents, the outcome follows an invariable script: players converge, posture briefly, exchange stern looks, and then, like a flash mob that suddenly remembers they all have somewhere better to be, disperse without incident.

The real stars of these non-events are the bullpen residents, relief pitchers, catches, and their coaches, jogging in from distances that sometimes exceed 400 feet. By the time they arrive, huffing and puffing, whatever minimal tension existed has typically dissipated, leaving them to awkwardly join a crowd that’s already in the process of breaking up.

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There’s something charmingly old-fashioned about how baseball clings to this peculiar tradition. In a sport rich with unwritten rules and time-honored customs, and a long list of recent amendments to make the game go faster, the bullpen dash stands out as perhaps the most gloriously unnecessary.

Nobody’s quite sure why we still do it, but it wouldn’t feel right without it. There’s a wonderful absurdity to it all.

Perhaps that’s the beauty of baseball.

Michael Kay

Orioles

Yankees

Mohsin Baldiwala

mlb

Mohsin Baldiwala is a Master’s student in Journalism and freelance content producer who got hooked on baseball through Seinfeld’s hapless George Costanza. The same reason why he’s a Yankees fan. He writes about sports because he believes it can offer a brief escape from the world’s chaos. Even if that means enduring the heartbreak of the 2024 World Series.