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The Los Angeles Dodgers have moved on. Having dispatched the Diamondbacks, their last obstacle to the NL West title, they can now turn their attention toward getting ready for baseball's postseason.
For the Diamondbacks and their fans, there are no such diversions. And so the resentment over the Dodgers going out of their way to take their pennant-clinching celebration into the Chase Field pool continues to simmer.
There was more than a little day-after supposition -- both on social media and traditional media (check out what Gabe Kapler and Petros Papadakis and the FOX Sports Live crew had to say directly to the right here) -- that the Diamondbacks somehow brought this in-your-face humiliation on themselves by asking the Dodgers not to partake in an on-field celebration.
This suggestion brought a strong response from D-backs managing partner Ken Kendrick, who said there was a subtle difference in what the team requested of the Dodgers. What the D-backs asked, and they say was agreed to, was that after the Dodgers celebrated on the field, they not go back to the field after popping the champagne in the clubhouse.
"We asked that they not return to the field from the clubhouse after their celebration so that we could clear the stands. We didn't want their fans hanging around long after the game," Kendrick said in a text message.
"That plan was discussed with their GM (Ned Colletti) at the beginning of the series, and he agreed. Only the Dodgers would blame us for their lack of class."
U.S. Sen. John McCain weighed in on the subject on his Twitter feed, calling the Dodgers "spoiled brats."
Dodgers reliever, Brian Wilson, known to his teammates as Agent 00, responded to McCain's with a political taunt.
There is an etiquette to celebrating on the road, the D-backs suggested. They twice clinched NL West titles away from home, in San Francisco in 1999 and in Milwaukee in 2001, the year they went on to win the World Series. Their post-game partying remained inside.
The Brewers also have an outfield display -- a twisting slide above the left field fence that team mascot Bernie Brewer uses to celebrate a home run -- but the D-backs resisted temptation, as reliever Greg Swindell tweeted.
This back-and-forth hardly new.
The D-backs and Dodgers have not played nicely all year, really, in a feud that has simmered since late in the 2011 season when Clayton Kershaw hit Gerardo Parra in a Sept. 14 game. The day before, Parra homered in the seventh inning off Dodgers reliever Hong-Chih Kuo, who earlier in the at-bat threw a pitch that sailed over Parra's head. The Dodgers thought Parra over-celebrated.
Ian Kennedy hit Yasiel Puig and Zack Greinke in consecutive innings on June 11, the second coming after Greinke hit Miguel Montero. That triggered a benches-clearing brawl for which Kennedy was suspended 10 games, Eric Hinkse was given five (later reduced to time served waiting) and Dodgers Skip Shumkaker and J.P. Howell were given two games apiece. Howell was caught on film ramming D-backs assistant hitting coach Turner Ward into the railing in front of the D-backs' dugout.
When the Dodgers visited in July, Puig stiffed fellow Cuban Luis Gonzalez after Gonzalez attempted to introduce himself by the batting cage. D-backs catcher Miguel Montero also criticized rookie Puig for an arrogant attitude during that series.
Now this.
The teams open 2014 regular season with a two-game series March 22-23 in Sydney, Australia, where it is illegal to roam the streets wearing black clothes, felt shoes and black shoe polish on your face because cat burglars do that.
No mention of pool crashing.
