“I said ‘Are you drunk?'" - Ozzie Guillèn recalls infamous incident with Angel Hernandez
Ozzie Guillen and Angel Hernandez have been at odds on many occasions. Hernandez announced his retirement earlier this week, which prompted so many former managers and players to recall their own anecdotes from a three-decade-long umpire career.
Guillen has his own experiences with the ump, and one of them was particularly bad in 2010. Guillen called time, putting his hand up to make the signal to Hernandez and the rest of the umpires. Hernandez interpreted it as a call to the bullpen, thus forcing starter Mark Buehrle out of the game.
“Angel was so bad in Oakland ... And the manager came out, Art Howe, came out, ‘He called somebody in the bullpen.’ I go ‘Angel, I just called time-out.’ So, they have a big meeting."
The former Chicago White Sox manager insisted that all he'd done was call time and not signaled to remove his pitcher from the ballgame. Increasingly flustered, he then said:
“That day, I said ‘Are you drunk?’ I said ‘Angel, are you drunk? Are you drunk? Tell me you’re drunk. No? Bad answer. Because you’re really behind the plate like you spent all night drinking. Because you don’t have no clue what you’re doing.'”
Several players and umpires have had words for Hernandez over the years, but it's not likely that any of them were quite as brash as Guillen was to ask about the umpire's sobriety in the middle of a game.
Angel Hernandez wasn't coerced into retirement
Many fans and perhaps even some players or managers, had been begging for Angel Hernandez to retire for a long time. Earlier this week, they got their wish, but it came out of nowhere.
Hernandez walked away immediately, so it has prompted questions over how he came to that decision. However, an MLB insider has reported that the league did not coerce him into walking away.
They did approach him early in the season about retiring, and the two sides worked out an agreement for him to do so. It was all above board, though.