A 2020 fantasy football roster argument over Jeff Wilson Jr. of all players, led Reds outfielder Tommy Pham to slap Giants outfielder Joc Pederson before Friday night’s game. As a result, the MLB slapped Pham with a three-game suspension and hilarity ensued.
As is typical with fantasy football leagues, it wasn’t only a disagreement over a league rule. It was much deeper than that. It was Pederson’s subsequent chirping about Pham’s Padres’ team in the fantasy league’s group chat that really pissed Pham off.
“It was regarding my former team. I didn’t like that and I didn’t like the sketchy shit going on in the fantasy,” Pham said. “We had too much money on the line, so I look at it like there’s a code. You’re fucking with my money, then you’re going to say some disrespectful shit, there’s a code to this.”
This is something that Pham has held onto for quite some time — nearly two years ago to be exact.
“I said I didn’t forget about that shit, and I walked up to him and slapped him,” Pham said.
Before Saturday’s game, Pederson was quick to pull up the receipts from the league’s group chat. In short, Pederson texted a GIF of three weightlifters with Giants, Dodgers, and Padres logos superimposed over them. The GIF then showed the Padres’ lifter collapsing under the weight of the barbell — which represented the Padres’ shitty season after the team spent a lot of money in the off-season.
“Joc I don’t know you well enough to make any jokes like this,” Pham texted, per Pederson. “It was meant to be all fun and games. No hard feelings. Sorry if you took it that way,” Pederson replied.
“He kind of came up and said like ‘you remember from last year?'” Pederson said of Friday’s incident. “And I was like ‘fantasy football?’ He was like ‘yeah.'”
That’s when the slap heard around the world happened.
In all honesty, shame on MLB for hitting Pham with a three-game ban. Yeah, you probably shouldn’t go around slapping opposing players over two-year-old fantasy football trash talk, but still… it might be the most viral moment that the MLB has had in ages — maybe ever.
P.S. There’s nothing funnier and douchier than Pham calling himself a “big dog in Vegas” and a “high roller at Vegas casinos”
P.P.S. Every single fantasy league in America needs one, if not two, IR spots, and that’s not debatable
