Due being ejected in the top of the thirteenth inning in Clemson’s Super Regional loss to Florida on Sunday, Clemson head coach Erik Bakich was not allowed to attend the postgame to provide any insight on the controversial ejections that took place during the season ending defeat.

It all started when Jack Crighton was thrown out after an a altercation between the Gators’ Jac Caglianone and Nolan Nawrocki due to a hard tag at first for the final out of the inning. While no punches were thrown, there was at least one shove that took place and both teams were issued official warnings.

Crigthon was rounding third when the final out took place and was heading back to the dugout. Despite several other players also leaving their positions on the field or in the dugout, Crighton was the only player tossed and Tuesday morning Bakich joined The Mickey Plyler Show to finally to give his perspective.

“The way it was explained to me, there are a lot of judgment calls on the field in real-time,” Bakich said. “Then you also go to the eye in the sky, so to speak, and what they’re looking at is who is off the bench or who left their position. And somehow Jack Crighton was on second base and the check-swinging bunt happened and Jack Crighton is rounding third and on his way home, the tag happens, the inning is over, is the way I look at it.”

“Jack Crighton continued to run, then there’s a push and an altercation and then Jack Crighton takes a left turn and joins his teammates. The interpretation was he left his position on the bases to get into the altercation and he was the one solely picked out to be ejected, which that was a tough pill to swallow there.”

And that was just the beginning of the craziness. With the game tied in the top of the thirteenth, and the season on the line, Alden Mathes hit a solo shot out to right to give the Tigers a one-run lead and slammed his bat into the ground in front of the Clemson dugout. After he rounded the bases the umpires huddled up for a lengthy discussion with it looking like Mathes was about to be ejected as well.

While Mathes was allowed to remain in the game, Bakich, along with assistant Jack Leggett, would both end up being ejected.

“Alden spikes his bat and this just had happened (ejection) with Jimmy Obertop and having to sit out the next game,” Bakich said. “So we all thought that was (going to happen) and that was what they were huddling up about is to determine if Alden was going to be ejected for spiking his bat. Which means he was not only ejected from that game but the next game.”

“So I immediately ran out and said ‘He threw it at our dugout. He spiked it at our dugout,’ which is, by rule, you’re allowed to do it to your own dugout. You’re not allowed to do it to the other team’s dugout. And so they shooed me off a few times and I kind of backed up. And look, the crowd was going nuts. You couldn’t hear anything. I couldn’t hear anything from our dugout because the crowd noise was so high. And one of the umpires turned and saw Coach Leggett animated, and he tossed him.”

Bakich and Leggett were also hit with suspensions for the ejections, which means Clemson will be without multiple coaches when the Tigers open the 2025 season in Arlington, Texas.

“And so then, of course, Coach Leggett comes out and the crowd goes even more nuts. I kind of gave Leggett a low-five and then turned to the crowd and waved my arms to the crowd to incite the crowd and the crowd being as awesome as they are and this awesome Clemson community they are; going nuts, and the umpires continued to meet, and then finally they’re done meeting, and they call me over to the line, and he says that Jack Leggett is ejected and he can’t be yelling at the umpires from the dugout and he’s also suspended for coming out onto the field. I say, ‘Are we really going to suspend Jack Leggett?’ He said yep, we’re going to do that, and because you incited the crowd and waved to the crowd when he was out there as well, you’re ejected too, and he tossed me and just walked away. And so, of course, then I lost my stuff and got an additional two games for wanting to get a man-to-man, face-to-face explanation of that, but I couldn’t get that.”

“That’s kinda how it happened. So I had already been tossed and didn’t even know it from just inciting the crowd when coach Leggett was standing out there. It was just matter-of-factly, cavalierly just, ‘and you’re tossed too.’ Get thrown out and just turn around and walked away. Most umpires, when you get tossed, they’ll give you that opportunity, and then one of the umpires will come in and tell you that’s enough. And the guy did, but it was almost like too late. I had already made my way onto the field, and then he held the fingers up for two games right away, and so ‘Well, at this point, screw it.’ Try to get a say.”

There is the option of appealing the suspensions, but Bakich didn’t appear confident anything would come of that.

“I just don’t know if it will do anything, we can certainly try,” he said. “There doesn’t seem to be any type of oversight or overturn or anything, but we can certainly give it a shot. As it stands right now, I’ll have to sit out the first two games of 2025, and so will my wingman, Jack Leggett.”

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