Rodolfo Castro was safe at third base but got called out anyway.
On the day the Pittsburgh Pirates second baseman was called up from Triple-A Indianapolis, he made national waves Tuesday night when his cellphone popped out of his back left pocket while sliding headfirst into third in the fourth inning at the Arizona Diamondbacks.
In a postgame interview on AT&T SportsNet, Pirates manager Derek Shelton said Castro “made a general mistake,” explaining that Castro put the oven mitt handguard on top of the phone and forgot about it.
“I thought the umpires handled it very well and did a good job,” Shelton said. “There was no intent to do anything. He made a mistake and kept his phone in the pocket.”
This is a first… Rodolfo Castro's phone fell out of his pocket in the middle of the game ???? pic.twitter.com/qaPd34qroF
— Bally Sports Arizona (@BALLYSPORTSAZ) August 10, 2022
Castro went from first to third on a single to center by Oneil Cruz. When Castro popped up and stood on the bag, third-base umpire Adam Hamari pointed to the phone on the infield dirt. Castro handed it to Pirates third-base coach Mike Rabelo, then was stranded on Greg Allen’s groundout.
Shelton said he found out about the incident when Rabelo returned to the dugout, and that the Pirates coaches talked to Castro, through translator Mike Gonzalez.
“He was like, ‘I was totally unaware I had it in there. Forgot about it. Didn’t feel it because the oven mitt was on top of it,’ ” Shelton said.
Bally Sports Arizona’s video of the play — captioned, “This is a first …” — went viral on Twitter, with more than 607,000 views and 600 retweets within an hour and comments joking about Castro waiting for a call-up.
The 23-year-old Castro is no stranger to controversy. He was demoted to Triple-A Indianapolis on June 5, one day after failing to run out a pop fly that dropped for a double play in a 2-1 loss to Arizona at PNC Park. Castro also committed an error at shortstop in that game.
Shelton was critical of Castro, saying the lack of hustle on the pop fly was “not acceptable.” Shelton later called it a “bad moment” but one that was “uncharacteristic” of Castro.
“That wasn’t the sole reason that Rudy was optioned down,” Shelton told AT&T SportsNet on Tuesday’s pregame show. “There were other factors during that time. But that was a learning moment for him and a message. Clearly, he’s gone down and worked really hard. He’s very aware of it. Like we’ve talked about, young players make mistakes. That mistake, as soon as it happened, was moved on from. It’s something he’s learned from, and we look forward to him providing the energy that we’ve seen previously.”
Castro slashed .284/.341/.481 with for doubles, four home runs and eight RBIs last month in Triple-A and was slashing .308/.357/.538 in eight games this month, prompting the Pirates to promote him and option outfielder Cal Mitchell to Indianapolis.
“I really appreciate the team giving me the opportunity and trusting me again,” Castro said through Gonzalez before Tuesday’s game. “I really value this. I took ownership. I continue to take ownership of the areas that I need to continue to get better at. That’s every ballplayer. We all got to get better.
“I know I went through some challenging moments up here, but those are things that I never allowed to discourage me. If anything, I encouraged it to help me grow.”
Afterward, Shelton emphasized that there “was no intent” by Castro to use the phone during the game but said he was “sure we’ll hear from the league.”
MLB issued a memo in 2020 prohibiting cellphones for communication with on-field personnel, but it is unclear how that applies to the possession of devices that are not in use.
“You stay around the game, and you see things you haven’t seen before,” Shelton said. “Again, this was just a kid who made a mistake. … It’s just one of those things we move forward from and tell him, ‘You can’t do that.’ ”
