Ke'Bryan Hayes on sunflower seed incident: 'Moving forward, I’ll be more mindful of that'

After being caught on camera pulling sunflower seeds out of his back pocket as a New York Mets runner rounded third base on Friday, Ke’Bryan Hayes shrugged off criticism and was back in the starting lineup for Saturday night’s game.

The Pittsburgh Pirates third baseman was ripped by SNY analyst Todd Zeile in the postgame show for having his glove off as Eduardo Escobar ran by him to score from first base on a single to right field by Tomas Nido in the third inning of a 4-3 loss to the Mets.

“I eat seeds the whole game,” Hayes told reporters Saturday afternoon at Citi Field. “I’ve been doing it, so I guess it just happened to be on camera. … There’s no play at third. The ball was all the way in right field, so I can see how someone would say something, but I don’t really care (about the criticism). I’m ready every pitch. I don’t have anything to say, to be honest.”

Here’s the full pregame interview with Hayes about SNY catching him grabbing sunflower seeds while the play was still going.

Says he didn’t see there being a play at 3rd, but “I can see how someone would say something.” He’s going to wait until after plays for seeds from now on. pic.twitter.com/MT5VIhqbsS

— Alex Stumpf (@AlexJStumpf) September 17, 2022

Pirates manager Derek Shelton, who called it “an unfortunate situation and an outlier situation,” said he discussed the play with Hayes but didn’t consider benching the 25-year-old, who leads all players at his position and ranks third in the majors in defensive runs saved (19).

“No, there’s no disciplinary action,” Shelton told reporters. “It’s one play in a game. We moved on from it. We had a conversation about it and we move on.”

The Pirates signed Hayes to an eight-year, $70 million contract before the home opener in April, and Hayes acknowledged that the incident was magnified because he’s the player considered the face of the franchise.

“Yeah, probably,” Hayes said. “Going forward, I can’t do that in the middle of a play, regardless of where the ball is. Moving forward, I’ll be more mindful of that. I guess I’ll only get seeds in between plays.”

The play went viral on social media after Zeile ripped Hayes and the Pirates (55-90), who clinched their third season in four years with 90 or more losses, in the SNY postgame show: “That’s September baseball when you’re in the Pittsburgh Pirate organization right now.”

Shelton shared that part of his conversation with Hayes was that he was out of position and should have been playing closer to third base but called it an “outlier play.”

“If you watch Ke’Bryan, 99% of the time he’s in the right place defensively,” Shelton said. “We talked about where he should have been. He took ownership of it. He talked to you guys and took ownership of it. We move on.”

Everyone was watching Eduardo Escobar dash home in the 3rd, but did you notice Ke'Bryan Hayes eating sunflower seeds during the play?@Todd_Zeile on Mets Post Game: pic.twitter.com/Ca6v75UPau

— SNY (@SNYtv) September 17, 2022

Shelton took exception to Zeile’s suggestion that the Pirates aren’t playing hard this month. Shelton noted that the Pirates dealt with an effort issue “fairly drastically” in June, when Rodolfo Castro was optioned to Triple-A Indianapolis a day after failing to run out an infield pop fly that dropped for a double play against Arizona.

Shelton also used Hayes as an example of the Pirates’ effort. Hayes sprinted to first base to beat an errant throw by Escobar to start the fifth inning against the Mets on Friday, advanced to second on Cal Mitchell’s single and scored on an infield chopper by Michael Chavis to cut their deficit to 2-1 in the fifth inning.

“My reaction to that would be: No. 1, our guys play hard every night,” Shelton said. “If we want to use Ke’Bryan as an example, if you watch the fifth inning of last night’s game, we score our first run, he hits a ball down the line, runs hard, Escobar makes a wild throw, we got on an error. Chavis comes up (two) hitters later, hits a soft roller he runs it out, Ke’Bryan makes a really good read on a first-and-third, less-than-two-outs situation if it’s going to be a double play, runs hard and scores.

“That’s Pirates baseball in September.”