Video: Here’s how baseball should really pay tribute to Jose Fernandez

It probably wasn’t the greatest moment of Jose Fernandez’s career by the usual baseball standards, but God, if he didn’t love that night in 2013 against the Atlanta Braves when he smacked his first career home run.

He was a pitcher, so this was a big deal. He was a 20-year-old rookie, so this was a thing of dreams. And he had a big fun-loving personality, so this was a moment he wanted to watch.

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He watched that homer so long the Braves felt like they needed to fight him. The benches cleared. People yelled at and pushed each other. At one moment, if you looked off the side, you saw Fernandez, a big, happy, smiling face among the angry ballplayers shouting at each other about a perceived slight of their unwritten code.

This was Jose Fernandez. He had fun playing baseball and didn’t apologize for it, even if the tired ol’ unwritten rules frowned on such things.

So as we talk about baseball paying tribute to Fernandez — who died Sunday at age 24 in a boating accident — there are many good ideas out there. But to me, there’s an easy and long overdue one and I tackle it in this week’s installment of my Open Mike video series.

Baseball needs to chill out on the unwritten rules. Players should be allowed to have fun and enjoy their successes without getting a beanball in return. More players need to play like Fernandez. Or if that’s not their style, they need to appreciate that it might be someone’s style and just let it go instead of starting a fight.

Let’s have that be a part of Jose Fernandez’s legacy. Because life is too short not to watch your home runs.

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Mike Oz is the editor of Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at mikeozstew@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @MikeOz