GOODYEAR, Arizona – It wasn’t exactly the way either one of them wanted to make an impact this spring.
But Cincinnati Reds teammates Hunter Greene and Elly De La Cruz provided the gotta-see-it moment of the spring — which the team’s president and, yes, an intrepid reporter with a video camera did see, the latter capturing it for posterity when a foul ball hit by De La Cruz off Greene during live batting practice reached a nearby parking lot, where it found the window of Greene’s car.
And Noelvi Marte thought he had it bad when De La Cruz broke his nose with a throw playing catch last season.
“That’ll teach you to park in the first spot,” said Reds president Nick Krall, who didn’t see the actual collision but later took a picture of Greene’s busted window.
‘The funniest thing is he was pitching,’ De La Cruz said. ‘He said, ‘You gotta pay for it.’ ‘
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De La Cruz said that’s not gonna happen.
‘I got no money for that,’ said the budding young hitting star, who only broke into the majors last June. ‘That’s an expensive car.’
For what it’s worth ($53 million to be exact), Greene has the biggest contract among Reds players.
Besides, De La Cruz says it’s Greene’s own fault for throwing fastballs.
‘He should throw more sliders. Then I can’t hit the ball,’ he said. ‘He threw it too hard.’
Said Greene: ‘He should have gotten the bat head out quicker.’
When asked about whether Greene and De La Cruz might be able to expense the damage, Krall said he’d have to look into it.
Meanwhile, somebody joked Wednesday morning with Greene about whether he had a deal yet with Columbus-based Safelite, the auto-glass repair company, and he was already on it.
‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘But my agents are actually working on it. Truly.
‘It’d be funny to get something out of it.’
Greene was driving a different car by Wednesday morning with the damaged car in the shop.
He also found a different place to park.
‘I parked a little further today,’ he said. ‘Now I’m going to be parking over by Cleveland.’
He probably meant the Guardians’ side of the shared spring training complex in Arizona.
The only thing for sure at this point is that wherever De La Cruz goes on the practice field or in games, it will be must-see viewing the rest of the spring.
‘But I don’t want to do any more damage,’ he said.