Hockey analyst Don Cherry has a cranky Harper-Papelbon take

Jonathan Papelbon choking Bryce Harper in the dugout was bad, right? Not according to hockey commentator Don Cherry.

Jonathan Papelbon choking Bryce Harper in the dugout was bad, right? Not according to hockey commentator Don Cherry. 

Cherry, the Great White North’s primary grit evangelist, defended Papelbon in a tweetstorm on Tuesday morning that’s got enough logical flaws and factual inaccuracies to make your head spin. 

1) I suppose everybody has seen Papelbon and Harper and their little dispute in the dugout. Papelbon was suspended for the year actually by

— Don Cherry (@CoachsCornerDC) September 29, 2015

2) the team and the league. How anybody could blame Papelbon for confronting Harper boggles the mind. Alright, Papelbon shouldn’t have done

— Don Cherry (@CoachsCornerDC) September 29, 2015

3) what he did to Harper on the bench. He should have waited for him in the tunnel and choked him there. For Harper criticizing his own

— Don Cherry (@CoachsCornerDC) September 29, 2015

4) teammate publicly, and that’s the word, publicly, for throwing at Machado saying now they will throw at me next game. Can you imagine how

— Don Cherry (@CoachsCornerDC) September 29, 2015

5) Papelbon felt when he heard that? He’s having a tough time this year anyhow, now the so called face of baseball throws him under the bus,

— Don Cherry (@CoachsCornerDC) September 29, 2015

6) his own teammate. People who criticize Papelbon, rightly so for doing it openly, never played the game. Never, never, ever openly

— Don Cherry (@CoachsCornerDC) September 29, 2015

7) criticize your teammate no matter what he does. In the dressing room that’s ok, yes but what is said in the dressing room stays in the

— Don Cherry (@CoachsCornerDC) September 29, 2015

8) dressing room. Some people say they can understand how Harper just jogs down to first on a pop up. They say well, hey they have already

— Don Cherry (@CoachsCornerDC) September 29, 2015

9) played 152 games. The guy is getting 10 zillion dollars a year, at least he can hustle to first base.

— Don Cherry (@CoachsCornerDC) September 29, 2015

• CORCORAN: Papelbon-Harper drama far from Nationals' only issue

You got that? Criticizing your teammate for throwing at a guy’s head is bad and the correct response to choke your critical teammate (as long as it’s out of the view of television cameras). 

Not only does Harper not make “10 zillion dollars” (it’s actually $2.5 million, to Papelbon’s $13 million), he did run out the pop-up.

“He muttered in frustration, tossed his bat, shook his head and trotted down the line,” Adam Kilgore of The Washington Postwrote. “He reached the base. In Game 155 of a mathematically dead season, that constitutes running it out. That counts.”

But Cherry isn’t going to let facts get in the way of a good take when he calls his producer on the phone and tells her to tweet for him. 

- Dan Gartland