Last season, when the Twins won the American League Central thanks to an improbable sweep of the Tigers by the lowly Royals, Minnesota center fielder Torii Hunter reportedly promised "Dom Perignon for all of 'em." He may pay a price for his exuberance -- and that price may be a bit steeper than $190 a bottle.
Good guy that he is, Hunter actually followed through with his promise this week and had four bottles of the iconic bubbly to Mike Sweeney's locker in the visiting dugout at the Metrodome. That's where things get dicey. As the Minneapolis Star-Tribune reports, Hunter's gift is a violation of Major League Baseball's rule 21-b. In typical legalistic language, rule 21-b states that "Any player or person connected with a Club who shall offer or give any gift or reward to a player or person connected with another Club for services rendered ... in defeating or attempting to defeat a competing Club ... shall be declared ineligible for not less than three years."
Do we really think Hunter will be banned for three years? Of course not. Is it reasonable to think that the Royals' performance last season was in any way motivated by the idea that they might get $800 worth of booze? Sorta doubt that, too -- Mike Sweeney will make $11 million for the 2007 season.
That being the case, we expect the powers-that-be won't enforce the rule as written. Hunter will likely pay some nominal fine to a charity of his choice, KC will return the champagne, and that will be that.
But we have another question: why so cheap, Torii? I mean, four bottles for 30+ guys? What's that all about?
Originally published at About Baseball
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