I was in my car on Sunday morning en route to my first swim meet since the heart surgery (I was very pleased with my butterfly swims; not so happy with my god-awful freestyle) and I happened to come upon a local golf show here in Washington hosted by Steve Czaban, whose weekday show I appear on once a week.
As luck would have it, Czaban and his co-hosts—local golf pros—were interviewing a guy from The Middle Atlantic PGA about—you guessed it—the ending of The PGA. If I remembered his name I’d used it, but I don’t. The guy was basically blathering The PGA’s company line about how David Price did nothing wrong in not making sure Dustin Johnson knew he was in a bunker on that fateful 18th hole at goofy Whistling Straits nine days ago.
I’m not here to go over that whole mess yet again. I’ve made my position—which is backed up by most professional rules officials—clear and I’ve tried to clear up a lot of the factual inaccuracies that have been bandied about since the incident occurred: that rules officials aren’t supposed to give players warnings about potential rules violations (wrong); that not all groups at the PGA have rules officials walking with them (wrong) and that there was no change in the PGA of America’s approach to those bunkers in 2010 from 2004 (wrong, many were designated waste areas in 2004. That was a mistake repeated by this rules guy on Sunday).
My point here is this: Why is it so hard for people in sports—and in life—to simply say, “I blew it?” I make mistakes all the time. I have a bad habit, because I have a good memory, of not double-checking facts I THINK I know and sometimes I get it wrong. But that’s not really the kind of mistake I’m talking about. You CAN’T argue when you get the facts wrong. If I say Alfonso Soriano hit the home run to put the Yankees up 2-1 in game seven of the 2001 World Series in the ninth inning when he hit it in the eighth inning (as I once did, I would have SWORN it was the ninth) I’m wrong—no ifs ands or buts.
The kind of mistake I’m talking about is the one Price made. Or, on a much broader level the kind Roger Clemens made—not just screaming he’d never used steroids but swearing under oath he’d never used steroids. You see umpires in baseball do it all the time: they blow a call, they KNOW they’ve blown the call and so they overreact when someone argues and toss the guy from the game—making their mistake even worse. Recently I saw an umpire toss Ryan Zimmerman for throwing his bat down after striking out swinging. Zimmerman never looked back so he didn’t ‘show up,’ the umpire but got tossed anyway. Why? Because the ump, apparently reading Zimmerman’s mind, knew Zimmerman was upset about a 3-1 pitch he thought was ball four.
I still remember when I was researching, ‘Living on the Black,’ seeing an umpire named Tony Randazzo miss a call at first base by a full step—a much worse call than the one Jim Joyce made earlier this year to cost Armando Galarraga a perfect game. When Mets manager Willie Randolph came out of the dugout, largely to keep Tom Glavine from getting tossed from the game (Glavine, who might have argued five calls in 23 years) he said to Randazzo, “look Tony, just tell me you missed it and I’ll go back in the dugout.”
Randazzo began screaming at Randolph that he had NOT missed it and ended up ejecting Randolph. The next day, knowing Randazzo would have had the chance to see the replay, I knocked on the door of the umpires room and asked to speak to Randazzo. He wouldn’t even come to the door to talk to me.
That’s the opposite, as we all know, of the approach Joyce took. He saw the tape and instantly said he’d blown it, even went to find Galarraga to apologize. So what happened? Joyce almost became a heroic figure for simply saying, “I got it wrong, I’m sorry.”
Sure it’s tough to look in the mirror and know you’ve screwed up—especially in public—but admitting it is always the best way to go. My worst public mistake, as many if not most people know (God knows I get reminded about it enough) came during a Navy-Duke football game five years ago. The officiating was brutal—so bad that Navy Coach Paul Johnson after WINNING the game chased the officials off the field) and I—inexcusably, regardless of the circumstances, muttered ‘f------ referees,’ after an especially bad call, somehow forgetting I was on the air.
As soon as I realized what I’d done, I pulled myself off the air, found Eric Ruden, who runs the Navy radio network, told him what happened and offered to go on the air and resign. Both Ruden and Navy AD Chet Gladchuk said absolutely not, so I compromised and went back on and apologized. That was not—as Eric and Chet had said—‘the end of it;’—they had to fend off calls from some in the media that week wanting to know why I wasn’t going to be suspended.
“John made a mistake, he offered to resign and then he apologized on the air within minutes of the incident,” Eric told the AP that week. “We don’t need to do anything more.”
For the most part, people said and wrote that I should be given credit for instantly apologizing. To me, it was the only thing to do. Saying the refs were brutal would have just been excuse-making. It didn’t matter. I was un-professional.
How would people have reacted if Clemens had admitted what he’d done and said he was sorry the day after the Mitchell Report came out in 2007? They would have ended up cheering him for being man enough to admit he had behaved badly. Heck, look at how Andy Pettitte and Alex Rodriguez have been treated for ‘confessing.’
In 1993 a freshman Navy kicker named Ryan Bucchianeri missed an 18-yard-field goal in a driving rain at the buzzer that would have won the Army-Navy game. He didn’t hide from the media when the game was over, he stood up and said, ‘I lost the game.’ He refused excuses offered him—wet field, wet ball, rain in his face. He became a national hero to the point where Sports Illustrated did a nine-page story on him the next fall.
On the other hand there’s the newly-single Tiger Woods, who stalled and hid and then refused to take questions when he finally made a public appearance almost three months after he piled his car into a fire hydrant. Everything he’s done this year in public has been part of a strategy to get sponsors back. If you think you’ve seen any genuine remorse or sorrow, you’re just wrong. He’s sorry he got caught and that’s it. The public knows that which is why there might be many who want to see him be a great golfer again but there are few who sympathize with him on any level. If he’d REALLY been sorry and said so and acted that way—rather than blaming everyone else most of the time—people would not have condoned what he did but would have been more forgiving.
The same goes on a totally different level for David Price and The PGA of America. If Price had said when it was all over, “you know hindsight is 20-20 but I wish I’d said something to Dustin—especially given what happened,”—that would have been pretty much the end of it. The mistake would still be there, but Price would be remembered for grace under pressure (like Joyce) after an officiating mistake. Now, as the PGA and guys like the Middle Atlantic PGA guy continue to make mealy-mouthed excuses, the entire PGA looks bad.
From bad can come good. But not until you admit to your mistake.
Showing posts with label Jim Joyce. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jim Joyce. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Baseball continues to have too much bad umpiring, time for changes
Forty-one years ago today Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon. You would think by now the sports world would have replay figured out.
Only it doesn’t. In football, replay grinds games to a complete halt at both the NFL level and the college level and there is no guarantee that the call is going to be correct when all is said and done. Basketball is the same way. I was at a game last season where the officials went to replay on four consecutive plays because they didn’t think the clock had been set correctly. The game may still be going on for all I know. Hockey’s closer: Usually replay can determine if a goal has or has not been score fairly quickly or if a player was in the crease or had his stick above his shoulder. Even so, there are times when it takes a lot longer than it should to get the call right.
And then there is baseball. Bud Selig said last week at The All-Star game that there is, “little appetite,” for replay among people in the sport. That may be because baseball people have seen what replay has done to football and basketball and want no part of it. I actually get that although I also think if baseball were to add replay for safe-out calls like the one Phil Cuzzi so clearly blew on Sunday in San Francisco—not to mention the now infamous Jim Joyce blown perfect game call in Detroit earlier this season and for fair/foul calls—like the one Phil Cuzzi so clearly blew in the playoffs last October on Joe Mauer in the 11th inning of game two of Yankees-Twins (anyone see a pattern here?), it would be good for the game.
Actually there is another problem baseball has that has only a little to do with replay: there’s a lot of bad umpiring out there. One thing I do on vacation is watch a LOT of baseball; flipping from game-to-game most nights. Cuzzi was god-awful throughout the Mets-Giants game on Sunday but you can bet both MLB and the umpire’s union will defend him just as both almost always defend bad umpires.
My biggest problem is the strike zone. A few years ago when QuesTec was first used, umpires were virtually forced to start calling the high strike again. Until then, pitches at the belt were routinely being called balls. It now appears to me—and others—that they’ve gone back to squeezing pitchers on an almost nightly basis. I don’t know about you but I sit there all the time and watch a pitch and say, ‘that’s a strike,’ and the umpire never moves. I know those pitchtrax things are fallible but let me ask you a question: how often do you see a pitch outside that box called a strike? Almost never. How often do you see a pitch inside the box called a ball? Often.
On the night that Stephen Strasburg made his debut in Washington, I was sitting in the Pittsburgh dugout with Pirates pitching coach Joe Kerrigan and ESPN’s Jayson Stark (one of ESPN’s good guys). We were talking about pitch counts and the length of games. Kerrigan commented that the average game in 2010 required about 30 more pitches to complete than an average game did 20 years ago. Why, he asked, did we think that was the case.
“A lot of hitters are working counts more,” Stark said.
“Strike zone,” I said.
“Bingo,” Kerrigan said. “NO ONE calls the strike zone that’s in the rulebook. When was the last time you saw a pitch just below the letters called a strike? How about never. Check the rulebook. That’s a strike.”
There are other issues too—batters stepping out on every pitch; pitchers slowing down to an almost complete halt with runners on base—but the strike zone is an issue too. Not only does it mean more pitches are required but it means hitters are working with favorable counts far more often, leading to more hits, more walks and more runs—and more time. The only thing that has balanced some of that the last few years is drug-testing. There’s a lot less power in the game and a lot more warning track fly balls.
The first thing MLB should do is start firing bad umpires and let the union sue if it so desires. Why is Phil Cuzzi still working? He’s a proven incompetent with a bad attitude. So is C.B. Bucknor, who one pitcher described to me a couple of years ago as not being good enough to work in Double-A. There are plenty of others. Players get fired for not doing their job and so do managers. Why not umpires? The easiest game to officiate is baseball. The only serious challenge is balls and strikes about 99 percent of the time. If the other three guys have one tough call in a game, it’s a lot. A basketball official can have five block-charge decisions in the first five minutes of a game. Football officials have to decide what is or is not holding on almost every play. Hockey officials have to be on the move constantly and decide when physical contact is legal and when it’s not.
Umpires have the easiest job and the worst attitudes—generally speaking. It was too bad that Joyce, one of the best umpires and a very good guy, was in the middle of the blown perfect game. At the very least though, that call and that game and Joyce’s response to it should have sent a message to Selig that more replay—competently managed--is needed in the game.
You do NOT send the umpires into their locker room every time a replay is needed—the way they now do on home run calls. You have a replay official—not another umpire—in the press box who can hit a button to tell the home plate umpire he wants to look at a play when something appears blatantly wrong—like Joyce’s call in Detroit or Cuzzi’s call on Sunday. It would have taken under 30 seconds to get those two calls right. If the replay official needs more than 90 seconds to make a decision, the call on the field stands. Move on.
Of course baseball will continue to huff and puff and do nothing about any of this. Bad umpires will continue to umpire and there will be no replay anytime soon. On a different level it is sort of like drug-testing. MLB doesn’t want to wrangle with a union on something that is clearly needed so it will continue to duck the issue and say that all is well and, hey, look at our attendance!
Maybe they should call NASA for help. There doesn’t appear to be a whole lot going on over there these days.
------------------------------
John's new book: "Moment of Glory--The Year Underdogs Ruled The Majors,"--is now available online and in bookstores nationwide. Visit your favorite retailer, or click here for online purchases
Only it doesn’t. In football, replay grinds games to a complete halt at both the NFL level and the college level and there is no guarantee that the call is going to be correct when all is said and done. Basketball is the same way. I was at a game last season where the officials went to replay on four consecutive plays because they didn’t think the clock had been set correctly. The game may still be going on for all I know. Hockey’s closer: Usually replay can determine if a goal has or has not been score fairly quickly or if a player was in the crease or had his stick above his shoulder. Even so, there are times when it takes a lot longer than it should to get the call right.
And then there is baseball. Bud Selig said last week at The All-Star game that there is, “little appetite,” for replay among people in the sport. That may be because baseball people have seen what replay has done to football and basketball and want no part of it. I actually get that although I also think if baseball were to add replay for safe-out calls like the one Phil Cuzzi so clearly blew on Sunday in San Francisco—not to mention the now infamous Jim Joyce blown perfect game call in Detroit earlier this season and for fair/foul calls—like the one Phil Cuzzi so clearly blew in the playoffs last October on Joe Mauer in the 11th inning of game two of Yankees-Twins (anyone see a pattern here?), it would be good for the game.
Actually there is another problem baseball has that has only a little to do with replay: there’s a lot of bad umpiring out there. One thing I do on vacation is watch a LOT of baseball; flipping from game-to-game most nights. Cuzzi was god-awful throughout the Mets-Giants game on Sunday but you can bet both MLB and the umpire’s union will defend him just as both almost always defend bad umpires.
My biggest problem is the strike zone. A few years ago when QuesTec was first used, umpires were virtually forced to start calling the high strike again. Until then, pitches at the belt were routinely being called balls. It now appears to me—and others—that they’ve gone back to squeezing pitchers on an almost nightly basis. I don’t know about you but I sit there all the time and watch a pitch and say, ‘that’s a strike,’ and the umpire never moves. I know those pitchtrax things are fallible but let me ask you a question: how often do you see a pitch outside that box called a strike? Almost never. How often do you see a pitch inside the box called a ball? Often.
On the night that Stephen Strasburg made his debut in Washington, I was sitting in the Pittsburgh dugout with Pirates pitching coach Joe Kerrigan and ESPN’s Jayson Stark (one of ESPN’s good guys). We were talking about pitch counts and the length of games. Kerrigan commented that the average game in 2010 required about 30 more pitches to complete than an average game did 20 years ago. Why, he asked, did we think that was the case.
“A lot of hitters are working counts more,” Stark said.
“Strike zone,” I said.
“Bingo,” Kerrigan said. “NO ONE calls the strike zone that’s in the rulebook. When was the last time you saw a pitch just below the letters called a strike? How about never. Check the rulebook. That’s a strike.”
There are other issues too—batters stepping out on every pitch; pitchers slowing down to an almost complete halt with runners on base—but the strike zone is an issue too. Not only does it mean more pitches are required but it means hitters are working with favorable counts far more often, leading to more hits, more walks and more runs—and more time. The only thing that has balanced some of that the last few years is drug-testing. There’s a lot less power in the game and a lot more warning track fly balls.
The first thing MLB should do is start firing bad umpires and let the union sue if it so desires. Why is Phil Cuzzi still working? He’s a proven incompetent with a bad attitude. So is C.B. Bucknor, who one pitcher described to me a couple of years ago as not being good enough to work in Double-A. There are plenty of others. Players get fired for not doing their job and so do managers. Why not umpires? The easiest game to officiate is baseball. The only serious challenge is balls and strikes about 99 percent of the time. If the other three guys have one tough call in a game, it’s a lot. A basketball official can have five block-charge decisions in the first five minutes of a game. Football officials have to decide what is or is not holding on almost every play. Hockey officials have to be on the move constantly and decide when physical contact is legal and when it’s not.
Umpires have the easiest job and the worst attitudes—generally speaking. It was too bad that Joyce, one of the best umpires and a very good guy, was in the middle of the blown perfect game. At the very least though, that call and that game and Joyce’s response to it should have sent a message to Selig that more replay—competently managed--is needed in the game.
You do NOT send the umpires into their locker room every time a replay is needed—the way they now do on home run calls. You have a replay official—not another umpire—in the press box who can hit a button to tell the home plate umpire he wants to look at a play when something appears blatantly wrong—like Joyce’s call in Detroit or Cuzzi’s call on Sunday. It would have taken under 30 seconds to get those two calls right. If the replay official needs more than 90 seconds to make a decision, the call on the field stands. Move on.
Of course baseball will continue to huff and puff and do nothing about any of this. Bad umpires will continue to umpire and there will be no replay anytime soon. On a different level it is sort of like drug-testing. MLB doesn’t want to wrangle with a union on something that is clearly needed so it will continue to duck the issue and say that all is well and, hey, look at our attendance!
Maybe they should call NASA for help. There doesn’t appear to be a whole lot going on over there these days.
------------------------------
John's new book: "Moment of Glory--The Year Underdogs Ruled The Majors,"--is now available online and in bookstores nationwide. Visit your favorite retailer, or click here for online purchases
Friday, June 4, 2010
Galarraga-Joyce saga continues – in aftermath, everyone on target except for Bud Selig
It is remarkable how the Armando Galarraga-Jim Joyce saga has continued to dominate the news in the past 48 hours. Remarkable, actually, in a good way because both men have behaved admirably in the wake of Joyce’s blown call on Wednesday. The story has become one of those that transcends sports. Both The New York Times and The Washington Post had stories on the front page of the newspaper this morning and The Post’s editorial page, which generally is completely unaware that sports exists outside the DC beltway, ran an editorial on the story—although it somehow found a way to tie it all back to how it affects Washington.
In the news business we call that the, “Dwight D. Eisenhower, who once flew over Trenton….was elected President last night,” approach to journalism.
Anyway, back to Galarraga and Joyce—and Bud Selig who has now become a major part of the ongoing saga.
The feel good part of this story is the way all of those directly involved have handled it. Joyce not only admitted he had gotten the call wrong once he saw it on replay, he sought out Galarraga to tell him how sorry he was about it. Galarraga accepted the apology and went out of his way to talk about how classy it was of Joyce to come and find him.
On Thursday, the Tigers and Indians wrapped up their series in Detroit with a 1 o’clock game. With Joyce scheduled to work the plate, there was all sorts of potential for disaster and trouble. When Don Denkinger worked the plate in game 7 of the 1985 World Series after his game 6 gaffe at first base, he ended up tossing both Whitey Herzog and Juaquin Andujar. That game was played in Kansas City, not St. Louis. God only knows what would have happened if the Cardinals had been the home team that night.
As has often been the case throughout his career, Tigers manager Jim Leyland did the exact right thing: He sent Galarraga to the plate with the Tigers lineup card. As soon as Galarraga walked up to Joyce and shook his hand, the fans who had been booing the umpires when they walked onto the field stopped. Many stood to applaud Galarraga. Joyce gave him a pat on the back as the meeting broke up and then turned into the Tigers dugout and pointed at Leyland to say, ‘thank-you.’
It was one of those cool sports moments where everyone gets it right. The Tigers won a 12-6 slugfest and there wasn’t any sign of trouble in Comerica Park throughout the afternoon. Kudos to all—including the Detroit fans.
Meanwhile, Selig was doing his best/worst imitation of Hamlet. He had an almost unique opportunity to right a wrong and send everyone home happy and he flat out blew it. All he had to do was say this: “After looking at the replay over and over; after hearing what Jim Joyce and Jason Donald (the Indians baserunner on the blown call) had to say and given the unique circumstances: the game was over if the call was made correctly AND by overruling it I am not changing the result in any way at all—it was 3-0 Tigers when the call was made and the final score was 3-0 Tigers with no further baserunners—I’m invoking my ‘best interests of the game,’ powers to reverse the call. Jason Donald was out. Armando Galarraga pitched a perfect game.”
There is NO reasonable argument against this. To those who say Selig is setting a dangerous precedent I say this: fine. Let him declare that at any time in the future if a pitcher gets the first 26 outs of a game and then fails to get the 27th on a clearly blown call by an umpire who instantly says he blew the call, he will do the same thing. There’s your precedent. Now let’s sit back and wait for it to happen again.
Last night, Ken Burns, the noted baseball historian was on Keith Olbermann’s show. He started going on about ‘unraveling the sweater,’ by reversing this call. He brought up Bucky Dent’s home run, asking if it should be taken away because Dent may have used a corked bat. He mentioned the Giants stealing signs prior to the Bobby Thomson home run and Mark McGwire’s steroid induced home runs.
Oh please. Those are ridiculous analogies. For one thing, they involve cheating, not an out-and-out honest mistake that has been confessed to by the person who made the mistake. Second, a million different things could have happened—we’ll never know—if there was no corked bat (maybe Dent doubles; maybe the game is played differently if the Yankees aren’t ahead after Dent’s at bat, WE DON’T KNOW); same thing with Bobby Thomson or any other example like that baseball people might want to bring up.
Here, we know. There are no ‘what-ifs,’ involved. If Joyce makes the right call, the game is over. Even in the case of Denkinger, the Cardinals still had chances to win the game—all Denkinger did was give the Royals a baserunner leading off the ninth. It was a horrible mistake but there is no way you could go back and correct it once the game was over.
This can be corrected. Put simply, it is the right thing to do. Selig already changed the rules on postseason rainouts in the middle of a World Series, so why not do this? It would be the right thing for Galarraga certainly; it would save Joyce, a good umpire and a good man, a lifetime of carrying the label of blowing this call and it would be—wait for it—RIGHT FOR BASEBALL. If Ken Burns or some of the so-called ‘purists,’ want to get into a dither over it, let them. Most people who love the game would be happy that justice was done and there’s no harm done to anyone in the process. As I said, the next time something EXACTLY like this happens, let the commissioner do the same thing. My guess is Bob Costas’s great grandson will be commissioner by the time this exact circumstance comes up again.
Selig was absolutely babbling yesterday when he went on about how great everyone in the game was; how proud he was of Galarraga and Joyce and everyone else who has ever set foot on a baseball field. Remember, I’m not a Bud-basher. I like the guy and I think he’s done a lot of things right as commissioner. This time though the Selig-gyrations need to just stop and he needs to just do the right thing if only to get the governor of Michigan to stop issuing proclamations.
Here’s the scorecard right now: Galarraga—perfect. Leyland—perfect. Joyce—trying desperately to do anything possible to make up for his mistake. Tiger fans—fabulous. The leader of the sport?—hiding under a rock. Come on Bud, crawl out from under there and get this one right. Everyone else involved has brought honor to the game since Wednesday. Now it's your turn.
--------------------------------------
John's new book: "Moment of Glory--The Year Underdogs Ruled The Majors,"--is now available online and in bookstores nationwide. Visit your favorite retailer, or click here for online purchases
To listen to 'The Bob and Tom Show' interview about 'Moment of Glory', please click the play button below:
In the news business we call that the, “Dwight D. Eisenhower, who once flew over Trenton….was elected President last night,” approach to journalism.
Anyway, back to Galarraga and Joyce—and Bud Selig who has now become a major part of the ongoing saga.
The feel good part of this story is the way all of those directly involved have handled it. Joyce not only admitted he had gotten the call wrong once he saw it on replay, he sought out Galarraga to tell him how sorry he was about it. Galarraga accepted the apology and went out of his way to talk about how classy it was of Joyce to come and find him.
On Thursday, the Tigers and Indians wrapped up their series in Detroit with a 1 o’clock game. With Joyce scheduled to work the plate, there was all sorts of potential for disaster and trouble. When Don Denkinger worked the plate in game 7 of the 1985 World Series after his game 6 gaffe at first base, he ended up tossing both Whitey Herzog and Juaquin Andujar. That game was played in Kansas City, not St. Louis. God only knows what would have happened if the Cardinals had been the home team that night.
As has often been the case throughout his career, Tigers manager Jim Leyland did the exact right thing: He sent Galarraga to the plate with the Tigers lineup card. As soon as Galarraga walked up to Joyce and shook his hand, the fans who had been booing the umpires when they walked onto the field stopped. Many stood to applaud Galarraga. Joyce gave him a pat on the back as the meeting broke up and then turned into the Tigers dugout and pointed at Leyland to say, ‘thank-you.’
It was one of those cool sports moments where everyone gets it right. The Tigers won a 12-6 slugfest and there wasn’t any sign of trouble in Comerica Park throughout the afternoon. Kudos to all—including the Detroit fans.
Meanwhile, Selig was doing his best/worst imitation of Hamlet. He had an almost unique opportunity to right a wrong and send everyone home happy and he flat out blew it. All he had to do was say this: “After looking at the replay over and over; after hearing what Jim Joyce and Jason Donald (the Indians baserunner on the blown call) had to say and given the unique circumstances: the game was over if the call was made correctly AND by overruling it I am not changing the result in any way at all—it was 3-0 Tigers when the call was made and the final score was 3-0 Tigers with no further baserunners—I’m invoking my ‘best interests of the game,’ powers to reverse the call. Jason Donald was out. Armando Galarraga pitched a perfect game.”
There is NO reasonable argument against this. To those who say Selig is setting a dangerous precedent I say this: fine. Let him declare that at any time in the future if a pitcher gets the first 26 outs of a game and then fails to get the 27th on a clearly blown call by an umpire who instantly says he blew the call, he will do the same thing. There’s your precedent. Now let’s sit back and wait for it to happen again.
Last night, Ken Burns, the noted baseball historian was on Keith Olbermann’s show. He started going on about ‘unraveling the sweater,’ by reversing this call. He brought up Bucky Dent’s home run, asking if it should be taken away because Dent may have used a corked bat. He mentioned the Giants stealing signs prior to the Bobby Thomson home run and Mark McGwire’s steroid induced home runs.
Oh please. Those are ridiculous analogies. For one thing, they involve cheating, not an out-and-out honest mistake that has been confessed to by the person who made the mistake. Second, a million different things could have happened—we’ll never know—if there was no corked bat (maybe Dent doubles; maybe the game is played differently if the Yankees aren’t ahead after Dent’s at bat, WE DON’T KNOW); same thing with Bobby Thomson or any other example like that baseball people might want to bring up.
Here, we know. There are no ‘what-ifs,’ involved. If Joyce makes the right call, the game is over. Even in the case of Denkinger, the Cardinals still had chances to win the game—all Denkinger did was give the Royals a baserunner leading off the ninth. It was a horrible mistake but there is no way you could go back and correct it once the game was over.
This can be corrected. Put simply, it is the right thing to do. Selig already changed the rules on postseason rainouts in the middle of a World Series, so why not do this? It would be the right thing for Galarraga certainly; it would save Joyce, a good umpire and a good man, a lifetime of carrying the label of blowing this call and it would be—wait for it—RIGHT FOR BASEBALL. If Ken Burns or some of the so-called ‘purists,’ want to get into a dither over it, let them. Most people who love the game would be happy that justice was done and there’s no harm done to anyone in the process. As I said, the next time something EXACTLY like this happens, let the commissioner do the same thing. My guess is Bob Costas’s great grandson will be commissioner by the time this exact circumstance comes up again.
Selig was absolutely babbling yesterday when he went on about how great everyone in the game was; how proud he was of Galarraga and Joyce and everyone else who has ever set foot on a baseball field. Remember, I’m not a Bud-basher. I like the guy and I think he’s done a lot of things right as commissioner. This time though the Selig-gyrations need to just stop and he needs to just do the right thing if only to get the governor of Michigan to stop issuing proclamations.
Here’s the scorecard right now: Galarraga—perfect. Leyland—perfect. Joyce—trying desperately to do anything possible to make up for his mistake. Tiger fans—fabulous. The leader of the sport?—hiding under a rock. Come on Bud, crawl out from under there and get this one right. Everyone else involved has brought honor to the game since Wednesday. Now it's your turn.
--------------------------------------
John's new book: "Moment of Glory--The Year Underdogs Ruled The Majors,"--is now available online and in bookstores nationwide. Visit your favorite retailer, or click here for online purchases
To listen to 'The Bob and Tom Show' interview about 'Moment of Glory', please click the play button below:
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Last night’s imperfect game, renewed calls for expanded replay; Remarkable day in sports overshadowed
It is hard to know where to begin in discussing what will be known forever as Armando Galarraga’s imperfect game. Or maybe it will be known as Jim Joyce’s imperfect game because it was the umpire who broke up Galarraga’s perfect effort not the pitcher or a Cleveland Indians hitter.
By now everyone has seen the replay. Last night, in Comerica Park, Galarraga, who didn’t even begin the season in The Major Leagues after an injury-plagued 2009, retired the first 26 Indians. He got the first out of the ninth inning on an extraordinary running catch in centerfield by Austin Jackson on a long fly ball by Mark Grudzielanek. Jackson had his back to the plate on a play that looked a little bit like Willie Mays’s catch on Vic Wertz in the 1954 World Series, the difference being there was no one on base for Jackson to turn around and double up.
But it was against the Indians and it certainly seemed that fate and history were riding with Galarraga at that moment. (It was also a reminder that the Yankees may long regret trading Jackson). Galarraga got the second out easily and up to the plate came shortstop Jason Donald. He hit a grounder wide of first that Miguel Cabrera ranged right to field. Cabrera fed Galarraga and there it was, the 21st perfect game in history—the third (remarkably) this season.
Except that Joyce blew the call. Just flat out missed what was a routine call for a Major League umpire, especially a respected 22-year-veteran. You could see him start up with his arm for an instant, then change his mind and give the safe signal. Why he did that, what he thought he saw at that moment, is a question that will haunt him for a long, long time.
To his credit, Joyce didn’t try to duck and cover when the game was over—as many umpires and officials do after they blow a call. He made no excuses. “I just cost that kid a perfect game,” he said. “I thought he beat the throw. I was convinced he beat the throw until I saw the replay. It was the biggest call of my career.”
Sadly, it was. Joyce can get every call right for the rest of his life and he’s never going to get past this. Don Denkinger certainly never got past his horribly blown call at first base in the 1985 World Series. That call came in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game 6 with the Cardinals leading 1-0. Jorge Orta led off for the Royals and hit a ground ball wide of first (sound familiar?) that Jack Clark fielded and fed to pitcher Todd Worrell. Denkinger called Orta safe when he was clearly out. From there, the Royals built a two-run rally, aided by a passed ball and pinch-hitter Dane Iorg’s two run single, to win 2-1. They then won game 7 in a rout, 11-0.
As badly as Denkinger blew the call, the Cardinals still had chances to win, just as the Red Sox had a game seven (and led 3-0 in the sixth inning) in the 1986 World Series after Bill Buckner booted Mookie Wilson’s grounder to end game six. What’s more, the Mets had already tied the score when Buckner made his error so even if he had made the play, the game would not have been over.
This was game over. No ifs ands or buts. Joyce denied Galarraga a perfect game and there’s nothing that can be done to change that. Like Joyce, Denkinger had a distinguished career as an umpire—he worked in the big leagues for 30 years and was assigned to four World Series and multiple All-Star games and League Championship Series before and after, ‘The Call,’—but his legacy is that call. The same will be true of Joyce although one can only hope he won’t receive death threats the way Denkinger did. His willingness to admit his mistake instantly should help him. He even went so far as to ask to speak to Galarraga to personally apologize to him and was reportedly near tears talking about what had happened. Galarraga said after the game that he forgave him. If Galarraga forgives him, the rest of the world should too.
Of course the blown call will again raise questions about both umpiring and instant replay. Put simply, umpiring needs to be better. There are too many blown calls and too many hot heads umpiring games. When an umpire goes off, the way Joe West did a week ago on Mark Buehrle; the way Bill Hohn did recently on Roy Oswalt; HE should be subject to public discipline just as the player might be. Bad umpires should be demoted and/or fired the same way bad players are demoted and/or fired. Good ones should be given raises.
Replay is a far more controversial topic. No one wants to see baseball games take any longer than they already take. (The game in Detroit last night lasted one hour and 44 minutes, proving that with good pitching and batters standing in the box and hitting, games don’t have to take forever). But there is a way to allow replay for calls like this one without any major delays.
First, take replay out of the umpiring crew’s hands. Under the current rule, if there is a home run call in question, the four umpires all go back to their locker room, call up the replay, discuss it and then come out and announce the call. That’s not the way to do it.
The way to do it is to have a fifth umpire in a replay booth—just like in football—who has the authority if he sees a call that looks WRONG—not questionable, WRONG—to contact the home plate umpire and say, ‘give me a minute to look at this.’ Obviously balls-and-strikes would never be involved in replay. In fact, there should only be three circumstances when replay could be invoked: home runs, out/safe; catch or no catch. It would be nice to add fair/foul to that list but once an umpire calls a ball foul, you can’t go back and restart the play.
If a play is bang-bang or too close to call in any way, the call stands. If the press box ump looks at all angles and can’t tell right away a mistake was made, the call on the field stands. There should never be a delay of more than two minutes. Last night it would not have taken that long for the call to be corrected.
If a call is clearly wrong—as with Joyce last night—the fifth umpire lets the plate umpire know. How much do you think Jim Joyce wishes that system was in place last night? Ninety-nine percent of the officials I’ve met in sports through the years are good guys who want to get it right. I have no doubt that Joyce falls into that category.
All of us make mistakes in our jobs. The number of times I’ve been bailed out by editors is uncountable. Other times, I haven’t been bailed out and had to correct a mistake—including one in which I identified the wrong umpire on a blown call in the 1992 World Series. I felt pretty sick about that one. The only saving grace was that there was another printing to get it right.
Umpires don’t get another printing and they don’t have editors. But they CAN have some backup in the press box. Major League Baseball put in replay in midseason a couple of years ago, it can expand it and improve it in midseason now. It won’t give Armando Galarraga his perfect game back or keep Jim Joyce out of baseball history, but in all likelihood it will make the game better—for players, for umpires and for fans.
*****
The imperfect game overshadowed a remarkable day in sports: Ken Griffey Jr. retired after a remarkable career that should be given its due on another day; Serena Williams lost at The French Open and gave no credit to her opponent (surprise) and The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Chicago Blackhawks 4-3 in overtime to close the gap to 2-1 in The Stanley Cup Finals. Oh, in case you’ve forgotten, the NBA Finals start tonight after a FIVE-day layoff. I’m not sure which will end first, The NBA Finals or The World Cup.
--------------------------------------
John's new book: "Moment of Glory--The Year Underdogs Ruled The Majors,"--is now available online and in bookstores nationwide. Visit your favorite retailer, or click here for online purchases
To listen to 'The Bob and Tom Show' interview about 'Moment of Glory', please click the play button below:
By now everyone has seen the replay. Last night, in Comerica Park, Galarraga, who didn’t even begin the season in The Major Leagues after an injury-plagued 2009, retired the first 26 Indians. He got the first out of the ninth inning on an extraordinary running catch in centerfield by Austin Jackson on a long fly ball by Mark Grudzielanek. Jackson had his back to the plate on a play that looked a little bit like Willie Mays’s catch on Vic Wertz in the 1954 World Series, the difference being there was no one on base for Jackson to turn around and double up.
But it was against the Indians and it certainly seemed that fate and history were riding with Galarraga at that moment. (It was also a reminder that the Yankees may long regret trading Jackson). Galarraga got the second out easily and up to the plate came shortstop Jason Donald. He hit a grounder wide of first that Miguel Cabrera ranged right to field. Cabrera fed Galarraga and there it was, the 21st perfect game in history—the third (remarkably) this season.
Except that Joyce blew the call. Just flat out missed what was a routine call for a Major League umpire, especially a respected 22-year-veteran. You could see him start up with his arm for an instant, then change his mind and give the safe signal. Why he did that, what he thought he saw at that moment, is a question that will haunt him for a long, long time.
To his credit, Joyce didn’t try to duck and cover when the game was over—as many umpires and officials do after they blow a call. He made no excuses. “I just cost that kid a perfect game,” he said. “I thought he beat the throw. I was convinced he beat the throw until I saw the replay. It was the biggest call of my career.”
Sadly, it was. Joyce can get every call right for the rest of his life and he’s never going to get past this. Don Denkinger certainly never got past his horribly blown call at first base in the 1985 World Series. That call came in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game 6 with the Cardinals leading 1-0. Jorge Orta led off for the Royals and hit a ground ball wide of first (sound familiar?) that Jack Clark fielded and fed to pitcher Todd Worrell. Denkinger called Orta safe when he was clearly out. From there, the Royals built a two-run rally, aided by a passed ball and pinch-hitter Dane Iorg’s two run single, to win 2-1. They then won game 7 in a rout, 11-0.
As badly as Denkinger blew the call, the Cardinals still had chances to win, just as the Red Sox had a game seven (and led 3-0 in the sixth inning) in the 1986 World Series after Bill Buckner booted Mookie Wilson’s grounder to end game six. What’s more, the Mets had already tied the score when Buckner made his error so even if he had made the play, the game would not have been over.
This was game over. No ifs ands or buts. Joyce denied Galarraga a perfect game and there’s nothing that can be done to change that. Like Joyce, Denkinger had a distinguished career as an umpire—he worked in the big leagues for 30 years and was assigned to four World Series and multiple All-Star games and League Championship Series before and after, ‘The Call,’—but his legacy is that call. The same will be true of Joyce although one can only hope he won’t receive death threats the way Denkinger did. His willingness to admit his mistake instantly should help him. He even went so far as to ask to speak to Galarraga to personally apologize to him and was reportedly near tears talking about what had happened. Galarraga said after the game that he forgave him. If Galarraga forgives him, the rest of the world should too.
Of course the blown call will again raise questions about both umpiring and instant replay. Put simply, umpiring needs to be better. There are too many blown calls and too many hot heads umpiring games. When an umpire goes off, the way Joe West did a week ago on Mark Buehrle; the way Bill Hohn did recently on Roy Oswalt; HE should be subject to public discipline just as the player might be. Bad umpires should be demoted and/or fired the same way bad players are demoted and/or fired. Good ones should be given raises.
Replay is a far more controversial topic. No one wants to see baseball games take any longer than they already take. (The game in Detroit last night lasted one hour and 44 minutes, proving that with good pitching and batters standing in the box and hitting, games don’t have to take forever). But there is a way to allow replay for calls like this one without any major delays.
First, take replay out of the umpiring crew’s hands. Under the current rule, if there is a home run call in question, the four umpires all go back to their locker room, call up the replay, discuss it and then come out and announce the call. That’s not the way to do it.
The way to do it is to have a fifth umpire in a replay booth—just like in football—who has the authority if he sees a call that looks WRONG—not questionable, WRONG—to contact the home plate umpire and say, ‘give me a minute to look at this.’ Obviously balls-and-strikes would never be involved in replay. In fact, there should only be three circumstances when replay could be invoked: home runs, out/safe; catch or no catch. It would be nice to add fair/foul to that list but once an umpire calls a ball foul, you can’t go back and restart the play.
If a play is bang-bang or too close to call in any way, the call stands. If the press box ump looks at all angles and can’t tell right away a mistake was made, the call on the field stands. There should never be a delay of more than two minutes. Last night it would not have taken that long for the call to be corrected.
If a call is clearly wrong—as with Joyce last night—the fifth umpire lets the plate umpire know. How much do you think Jim Joyce wishes that system was in place last night? Ninety-nine percent of the officials I’ve met in sports through the years are good guys who want to get it right. I have no doubt that Joyce falls into that category.
All of us make mistakes in our jobs. The number of times I’ve been bailed out by editors is uncountable. Other times, I haven’t been bailed out and had to correct a mistake—including one in which I identified the wrong umpire on a blown call in the 1992 World Series. I felt pretty sick about that one. The only saving grace was that there was another printing to get it right.
Umpires don’t get another printing and they don’t have editors. But they CAN have some backup in the press box. Major League Baseball put in replay in midseason a couple of years ago, it can expand it and improve it in midseason now. It won’t give Armando Galarraga his perfect game back or keep Jim Joyce out of baseball history, but in all likelihood it will make the game better—for players, for umpires and for fans.
*****
The imperfect game overshadowed a remarkable day in sports: Ken Griffey Jr. retired after a remarkable career that should be given its due on another day; Serena Williams lost at The French Open and gave no credit to her opponent (surprise) and The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Chicago Blackhawks 4-3 in overtime to close the gap to 2-1 in The Stanley Cup Finals. Oh, in case you’ve forgotten, the NBA Finals start tonight after a FIVE-day layoff. I’m not sure which will end first, The NBA Finals or The World Cup.
--------------------------------------
John's new book: "Moment of Glory--The Year Underdogs Ruled The Majors,"--is now available online and in bookstores nationwide. Visit your favorite retailer, or click here for online purchases
To listen to 'The Bob and Tom Show' interview about 'Moment of Glory', please click the play button below:
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