Chase Utley gets to play tonight after appealing the suspension over his controversial slide

Major League Baseball ruled that Chase Utley is eligible to play in Queens tonight when his Los Angeles Dodgers face the New York Mets in Game 3 of the National League Division Series.

Utley had been suspended for two games due to his illegal slide in Saturday night's matchup that the league said interfered with Mets' shortstop Rubén Tejada's ability to turn a double play. Tejada left the game and was later diagnosed with a broken right fibula.

The veteran, who has said he didn't intend to hurt Tejada when he broke up a potential double play, promptly appealed the suspension. On Monday, the league agreed to move the appeal to a later date, given the narrow time frame with which the players union had to assemble an argument, BuzzFeed News reports. Part of Utley's case for arguing the suspension will be the fact that the league has no precedent for suspending people under the interference rule chief baseball officer Joe Torre cited Sunday.

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So the Dodgers are free to play Utley, who came in Saturday as a pinch hitter. The atmosphere at CitiField is bound to be a hostile one for him and his team, and he may risk getting hurt. It's tradition in baseball for pitchers to throw at opposing players in retaliation for previous slights. And even if the umpires successfully prevent physical confrontation by threatening both benches with ejection, expect deafening boos for Utley.