Pedroia apologizes to Machado after near-HBP from Red Sox
Dustin Pedroia wants Manny Machado to know how sorry he is that things got out of hand Sunday between the Boston Red Sox and Baltimore Orioles.
During the eighth inning, a pitch from Red Sox reliever Matt Barnes came awfully close to the head of Machado, which earned the pitcher an ejection and led to a heated exchange between the Orioles third baseman and Pedroia.
"I just told him I didn't have anything to do with that," Pedroia told reporters, including Brian MacPherson of the Providence Journal. "That's not how you do that, man."
Related: Pedroia tells Machado 'it's not me' during heated exchange
Although manager John Farrell and Barnes both claimed postgame that the pitch simply "got away," Pedroia wasn't pleased with how things were handled and offered his apologies to Machado.
"I'm sorry to him and his team," Pedroia explained, according to MacPherson. "If you're going to protect guys, you do it right away. He knows that. We both know that. It's definitely a mishandled situation. There was zero intention of him trying to hurt me. He just made a bad slide. He did hurt me. It's baseball, man. I'm not mad at him. I love Manny Machado. I love playing against him. If I slid into third base and got Manny's knee. I know I'm going to get drilled. That's baseball. I get drilled, and I go to first base. That's it."
The incident between the two clubs came after Pedroia was spiked in his left leg by Machado during a slide attempt Friday, which forced the second baseman from the game.
Pedroia will undergo an MRI on his left knee - which he underwent surgery on this past October - after swelling arose.