"An unusually large media crowd showed up before Wednesday's Rays-Mariners game at Safeco Field.

While the night's pitching matchup between Seattle's Cliff Lee and Tampa Bay's Matt Garza was a good one, that wasn't what drew the coverage.

They came to ask about Milton Bradley and the swirling reports of a possible incident between him and manager Don Wakamatsu during Tuesday night's 5-2 loss to the Rays. Bradley struck out looking with the bases loaded in the sixth inning. What happened after that is still a little unclear and neither Wakamatsu nor general manager Jack Zduriencik would say much about it.

"There was a lot of speculation of what happened yesterday," Wakamatsu said. "I think a lot of it got blown out of proportion. It wasn't a big issue."

Wakamatsu didn't like the emotional state that Bradley was in after striking out, and pulled him. Reports that Bradley took himself out of the game were false, Wakamatsu said.

"It wasn't his decision," Wakamatsu said. "He was going to go back out. I just felt that because he was emotional at that time, the best thing to do was to take him out of the ballgame."

If something happened after that – some sources reported Bradley left the stadium – nobody would confirm it."