Jose Bautista’s suspension upheld, will serve tonight

The one-game suspension to Toronto Blue Jays right-fielder Jose Bautista has been upheld by Major League Baseball following an appeals process.

Bautista will be serving his suspension tonight in game one of the Boston Red Sox series at the Rogers Centre.

This suspension dates back to the Rougned Odor incident in Texas, in which Odor punched Bautista following a hard slide into second base. It’s part of a much larger narrative, of course, both within that game and stretching back to Bautista’s bat flip in the 2015 playoffs.

Major League Baseball cited both Bautista’s actions on the field and his post-game comments in their suspension, the latter of which was especially bizarre. The most out-of-line thing Bautista said was that he had an opportunity to injure Odor on his slide if he’d wanted, but chose not to (which, of course, isn’t all that threatening).

Odor recently appealed his own eight-game suspension and the league decided to reduce his to seven games.

Ezequiel Carrera will start in Bautista’s place and bat leadoff. Troy Tulowitzki also returns to action, batting fifth, but given the short bench, the Blue Jays have opted not to make a corresponding move to give themselves a seven-man bullpen.