ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – As the foul popper off the bat of David DeJesus drifted further and further toward the crowd, Josh Donaldson made a decision to go for it, safety be damned, with Marco Estrada in the eighth inning of a perfect game bid.
The result is one of the best catches you’ll ever see, one that surely caused everyone with the Toronto Blue Jays to hold their breath until the all-star third baseman emerged unscathed.
“I know I’m going into the stands,” Donaldson said of his approach after a 1-0, 12 inning win over the Tampa Bay Rays on Wednesday afternoon. “As soon as I leave my feet I know I’m going in there. At that point of the game, as far as the score and then as far as what Marco was doing, I was willing to lay it on the line and take a couple of bruises to hopefully get him another out.”
Five pitches later, Estrada’s bid for perfection came to an end despite another slick play from Donaldson, when he barehanded a Logan Forsythe chopper and fired to first but a half-step too late.
Still, his catch left teammates, rivals and fans buzzing, reminiscent of Derek Jeter’s diving catch against the Boston Red Sox in 2004.
Here’s how Donaldson saw it off the bat: “When it was hit I thought it was kind of going to be right on the line, right on the first row or whatever. As I kept running, I could see that it was kind of drifting off a little bit and I felt like I could still make a play at it. The last time I looked down at the wall, I knew I was going to have to jump over the wall to make the catch. The last thought that was probably in my head, was to try to get over top of the people because it’s natural for fans, when the ball is in the stands, for them to reach up and stand up, so I was just trying to get up over the fans to be able to catch the ball.”
Donaldson did, remarkably holding on as he flopped into one fan, his leg knocking into a child.
Asked if a fan braced his impact, he replied: “I didn’t get that in depth into it. I felt a couple of chairs, I felt somebody hit my arm but at that time I’m just trying to make a play. Hopefully everybody was OK.”
As he emerged from the stands, he had a big smile on his face.
“I think why I smiled is I looked at Go-Go (Ryan Goins) and he had his hands on his head like (oh no),” said Donaldson. “That was pretty cool.”
Said Chris Colabello, who was at first base when it happened: “I threw my hands up in the air like I was a Little Leaguer. I was probably the first person to realize he caught it because I had a pretty good angle on it. It was pretty unbelievable.”
