Joc Pederson’s Ex-Teammate Explains How The Outfielder Avoided Getting Slapped By Tommy Phan During Series In 2021

• Joc Pederson did what he could to avoid getting slapped by Tommy Pham in the wake of their fantasy football beef
• The former Brave apparently knew Pham was looking for him when Atlanta faced off against the Padres in 2021
• One of his former teammates detailed how he initially avoided the punishment that was eventually doled out in May

It’s customary for fantasy football leagues to dream up ways of punishing players who end up finishing in last place when the season wraps up.

However, we were treated to a slightly different type of punishment last month courtesy of an incident involving Tommy Pham and Joc Pederson that remains one of the wildest things that’s unfolded during this year’s Major League Baseball season.

The two men made headlines back in May after Pham channeled his inner Will Smith and showed Pederson what the five fingers said to the face when he slapped the Giants outfielder after approaching him as he was gearing up for a game against the Reds.

Here is the original, no watermark if it matters. pic.twitter.com/jNuHxWxrVX

— Taylor Mannix (@taylormannix103) May 28, 2022

We soon learned the altercation stemmed from a dispute concerning the injured reserve status of Jeff Wilson Jr. in the fantasy football league the two men competed in last year. Mike Trout (who served as the league’s commissioner) seem to find the situation fairly amusing, but Pham (who received a three-game suspension for the slap) has refused to apologize for doling out the retribution he apparently waited a long time to dole out.

It would appear Pederson knew he was in Pham’s crosshairs last year based on what one of his former teammates had to say while discussing what went down when the Padres hosted the Braves for a series in San Diego toward the end of September in 2021 on a recent episode of The Chris Rose Rotation.

Here’s what Tyler Matzek (who played with Pederson in Atlanta last season) said about the strategy the outfielder deployed to avoid Pham via Larry Brown Sports:

“This was going on all last year. We would hear about this in our clubhouse before this ever happened.

The biggest one was when we went to San Diego, end of the year, and he literally did not leave the clubhouse. Joc did not leave the clubhouse because he knew Tommy Pham was out there and Tommy Pham wanted to slap him and beat him.

So he just stayed inside the clubhouse, didn’t take BP for three days, just hit inside the cage, and then would come out to the game.”

Say what you will about Pham’s actions, but you kind of have to respect his ability to hold a grudge.