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Sign up for the free Baseball Reference newsletter and get scores, news and notes in your inbox every day. As Gordon rounded the bases, Marlins teammates smacked the top railing, one of Fernandez’s signature celebrations. Gordon became extremely emotional as he pointed up to the sky. Marlins president David Samson said before the game that the entire locker room will struggle to "reset their equilibrium" after Fernandez's death.
Monday's win over the Mets was a small step in what will be a long healing process. There haven't been many smiles from the Marlins the past two days. But Gordon was able to share a rare smile after his homer with teammate Giancarlo Stanton, who usually is the Marlins player delivering long-distance bombs. Gordon’s homer was just the ninth of his six-year major-league career. At the same time, the rawness will fade, callous over, and become something entirely different.
Dee Gordon on HR: Jose Fernandez should've been there cheering
Ryon Healy of the Seattle Mariners is congratulated by teammates David Freitas and Dee Gordon after hitting a home run during a game against the... Dee Gordon of the Seattle Mariners laps the bases after hitting a two run home run against the Oakland Athletics to the tie game 3-3 in the sixth... Jean Segura of the Seattle Mariners celebrates with Dee Gordon after hitting a home run in the second inning against the Houston Astros at Minute... Domingo Santana celebrates with Dee Gordon of the Seattle Mariners after hitting a solo home run against the Boston Red Sox in the first inning... Dee Gordon of the Miami Marlins dunks a toy basketball over Marcell Ozuna after the Marlins' walk-off victory in the game against the Philadelphia...
The entire team wore No. 16 jerseys and gathered around the pitcher’s mound, many overcome with emotion. In honor of Fernandez, the Marlins pitcher who died in a boating accident early Sunday in Miami Beach, every Marlins player on Monday wore a jersey with his name and number, 16. The Marlins canceled their game that was scheduled for Sunday, against the Atlanta Braves, but they returned to Marlins Park on Monday to face the Mets in an emotional game.
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Gordon then switched helmets and went to his usual left-handed stance, and his first swing was a monster shot to right field off New York Mets pitcher Bartolo Colon. MIAMI -- The thoughts running through Dee Gordon's head after his first home run of the season ranged from hurried to confusion Monday night. The Miami Marlins second baseman created one of the memorable sports moments of 2016 as he fought back tears on his way to home plate. Then he crushed the third pitch from Bartolo Colon into the right-field seats — Gordon’s first home run of the season and just the ninth of his six-year major league career. Dee Gordon, right, rounding third base after his home run in his first at-bat Monday night.
The 6-3, 265-pound Bour completed the play by belly-flopping into third base as fans roared. “I saw him crying right when he rounded first base,” Mets catcher Travis d’Arnaud said. When he crossed home plate, tears were coming down his face, and they were coming down mine, too. When Gordon went up to bat in the bottom of the first, he had “No. When he wasn’t pitching, he was all about the team, giving a pretty fair impersonation of a cheerleader.
MLB Home Runs Hit by Dee Strange-Gordon | Baseball Almanac
It’s not like if Gordon’s home run didn’t happen, we’d have to invent it. There wouldn’t have been that one moment where we remembered just how it felt. We weren’t going to revisit the calls or the texts or the news reports or the tweets or however we all found out. There wasn’t going to be a video of what was going on inside your head for the first five minutes, the first hour, the first day, something easy to rewind and replay again.
While there’s a great chance that Dee Gordon’s home run on Monday will be the most emotional baseball moment any of us will ever witness, it’s not a great idea to power rank emotional moments. That’s doubly true when you’re in close proximity to one of them. Pitting Gordon’s home run against, say, Mike Piazza’s post-9/11 home run is like having a debate between food and water. The first pitch was eventually thrown, but the tributes and emotions didn’t stop there. When Gordon stepped to the plate to start the bottom of the first inning, he did so wearing a helmet with Fernandez’s number on it. The left-handed Gordon also stepped into the opposite batter’s box and took the first pitch right-handed in honor of Fernandez.
Every Miami Marlins player wore a jersey with Jose Fernandez’s name and number in the game. Gordon’s home run is the monument sticking out of that point in time now. It’s the unmistakeable beacon jutting out of the ground, a waypoint we can return to again and again and again when we want to remember the uncut devastation as it was.
But while the five stages of grief is probably oversimplified, most of us would agree that there is a progression. In about a month, we’ll be arguing about a bat flip in the World Series, or something equally as silly, as if any of it means a damned thing. We’ll return to our regularly scheduled lives, hard as ever, filled with frivolities and fun and genuine heartbreak, spoken fears piled under unspoken fears, maybe with a little hope mixed in. But we’ll get to return to all of that a lot sooner to the people who were close to Fernandez.
He not only loved to pitch, but he clearly enjoyed taking his hacks at the plate, too, and he was good at both. Miami’s motivation was clearly Fernandez, who died late Saturday night / early Sunday morning in a boating accident in which speed was a factor, according to authorities. Gordon, who weighs just 160 pounds and will never be confused with a power hitter, then switched to his normal left side and, on a 2-0 count, launched his first homer of the year. Dee Gordon made America cry on Monday night, and the moment will be there in 50 years when you want to cry again. Giancarlo Stanton of the Miami Marlins is congratulated by Dee Gordon after a two run home run in the first inning during a game against the San... Marcell Ozuna of the Miami Marlins is congratulated by Dee Gordon after hitting a home run in the first inning against the Philadelphia Phillies at...
Taking one pitch — and danged if he didn’t look like he was thinking about swinging -- as a right-handed batter was a touching gesture. But we wouldn’t look back on it and be transported right back to the emotional hurricane. But Dee Gordon made sure that we’ll never forget what it was like to experience the loss. Gordon is not a home run hitter — he’s now hit just nine in nearly 550 career games — but the emotional scene at Marlins Park had nothing to do with that. The Marlins spent the pregame honoring Jose Fernandez who died in a tragic boating accident on Sunday. The scene was about as emotional as you’ll ever see prior to a professional sporting event.
Nelson Cruz of the Seattle Mariners reacts with Dee Gordon, Denard Span, and Ryon Healy after hitting a there run home run during the first inning of... Dee Gordon of the Seattle Mariners celebrates a solo home run by Nelson Cruz of the Seattle Mariners in the eighth inning against the Los Angeles... Ryon Healy of the Seattle Mariners is congratulated by Dee Gordon of the Seattle Mariners after hitting a home run during a game against the Colorado... Cameron Maybin and Dee Gordon of the Seattle Mariners celebrates after Maybin hit a solo home run against the Oakland Athletics in the top of the... Dee Gordon of the Seattle Mariners drops Gatorade on Omar Narvaez after he hit a walk-off home run against the Chicago White Sox at T-Mobile Park on... Justin Bour of the Miami Marlins is congratulated by teammate Dee Gordon after Bour hit a solo home run in the eighth inning against the New York...
It’s the difference between a demon actively stabbing you with a pitchfork and a demon sitting on your shoulder whispering things you don’t want to hear. The entire night was handled beautifully by the Marlins organization — organic, simple, gorgeous, raw. During the game, the Marlins and their home crowd reinforced each other, held each other up. After the game, the players went back to the mound because they had to, acutely aware of how the night got progressively lonelier and lonelier. Giancarlo Stanton of the Miami Marlins celebrates with Dee Gordon as Christian Yelich looks on after hitting a home run during the eighth inning... Giancarlo Stanton of the Miami Marlins leaps to celebrate with teammates including Dee Gordon, right, after he hit his 56th home run of the season in...
Giancarlo Stanton of the Miami Marlins celebrates with Dee Gordon after hitting home run during the game against the Atlanta Braves at Marlins Park... Dee Gordon of the Seattle Mariners is congratulated by third base coach Scott Brosius after hitting a two run home run in the third inning of the... David Freitas of the Seattle Mariners congratulates Jean Segura of the Seattle Mariners after Segura hit a three-run home run off of starting pitcher...
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