Yet again, CC Sabathia proves his value to the Yankees extends far greater than his left arm.
On Thursday, Sabathia needed to throw seven innings to earn a $500,000 contract bonus for innings pitched. He was cruising against the Rays, throwing 54 pitches through five innings, looking likely to reach that threshold.
But then tempers flared. The Rays threw near Austin Romine's head in the top of the sixth. Knowing that any sort of retaliation would result in an automatic ejection, Sabathia had a decision to make: money or teammates?
For CC, it didn't take much consideration.
"I don't make decisions based on money," Sabathia said after the game. "I just felt like it was the right thing to do."
On his first pitch of the inning, Sabathia plunked Jesus Sucre and didn't need to look at the umpire to understand that would be the last pitch of the game.
As he was exiting the field, Sabathia quite clearly screamed at the Rays dugout: "That's for you, b----."
"I don't even remember what I said, I was just yelling," Sabathia said. "Y'all saw what happened."
Don't mess with CC, or The Judge.
- YES Network (@YESNetwork) September 27, 2018
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The sentiment was not lost on his teammates. Aaron Judge, who was pictured in front of most of the Rays dugout in the aftermath exchanging unpleantries, said "that's the guy you want to go to battle with." Giancarlo Stanton said "I'm with CC. Always."