Joe Davis, Spectrum SportsNet’s play-by-play announcer for the Los Angeles Dodgers, had baseball fans completely confused by a tense eighth inning moment during Friday night’s contest between the Dodgers and San Diego Padres.
With the score tied at seven, Dodgers shortstop Chris Taylor hit a rope down the third base line that snuck under the glove of Padres third baseman Tyler Wade.
"It gets under the glove of Wade. Mercury retrograde. Whatever that means."
– Joe Davis.pic.twitter.com/iuow1ei2W6
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) April 13, 2024
“It gets under the glove of Wade. Mercury Retrograde!” Davis exclaimed.
Davis’s broadcasting partner Eric Karros chuckled in laughter, before Davis chimed back in.
“Whatever that means. Go-ahead run is aboard here in the eighth.”
As it turns out, a planet in retrograde means that “from the perspective of earth, a planet’s motion across the sky goes backwards night after night compared to its usual direction for a period of time.” This phenomenon happens to Mercury three or four times per year.
Now Davis, Karros and baseball fans everywhere have familiarized themselves with a solar system concept that non-astronomers likely knew very little about.
Who knew that the lesson would come as a result of an April baseball game between the Dodgers and the Padres?
