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Cincinnati Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz and Seattle Mariners reliever Trent Thornton fell ill on Saturday while playing in the extreme heat covering much of the United States.
De La Cruz vomited on the field with two outs in the fourth inning of Cincinnati’s extra-inning loss at the St Louis Cardinals.
“I actually watched him. He drank a bunch of water. I mean a bunch,” Reds manager Terry Francona said, “and then he went right out and got rid of it.” The 23-year-old was well enough to stay in the game and hit a two-run homer in the seventh.
Thornton pitched two-and-a-third scoreless innings for Seattle before departing in the eighth in his team’s 10-7 loss at the Chicago Cubs. The 31-year-old right-hander had to be helped from the field.
Mariners manager Dan Wilson said Thornton had “a little bit of a heat-related illness”, adding: “It was a scary moment, for sure. He battled hard. But just really glad that he’s feeling a little bit better now and should be OK.”
The gametime temperature for Reds at Cardinals was 92F (33C), and it was 94F (34C) for the first pitch of the Mariners’ loss to the Cubs. Milwaukee’s game at Minnesota was played under an excessive heat warning.
Seattle and Chicago finished their game with three umpires after Chad Whitson fell will and was treated in the Mariners’ dugout. “He came in, same kind of thing. Just was not feeling well,” Wilson said. “Threw up a few times in the dugout and then they came and took care of him from there. The heat was a real thing today, for sure.”
Whitson was dealing with dehydration, but a Major League Baseball spokesman said he was had recovered by Saturday night and had been cleared to work third base for the series finale on Sunday. A Wrigley Field staffer had a heat-related medical issue right after Saturday’s game, according to a spokesman for the Cubs. He was tended to by medical personnel and walked off the field on his own.
The Cubs set up cooling and misting stations throughout Wrigley to help fans with the heat on Saturday, along with additional emergency personnel. The team had similar plans in place for Sunday, along with bringing in a city bus to use as a cooling station on the street.
The heatwave in the US is forecast to last until Thursday or Friday next week.
