At the risk of sounding like old man played by Dana Carvey on SNL it didn’t used be like this.  We watched our sports and took it like a man. 

Bill Klem, a Hall of Fame umpire who worked the game for 37 years, was known for saying, It ain’t nothin’ till I call it”.  Not anymore.  Everything is held in the court of public opinion and if the public is lucky, that will sway the sports’ organizations decisions. 

Just in the past month, we’ve had some close calls.  Baseball fans are going mental calling for the reversal of Jim Joyce’s last call of Armando Galaraga’s near perfect game.  (I don’t agree with Bud very often but I’ve come around to his thinking on this.  Can you imagine the precedent this would set?)

Earlier this month, umps at the Women’s Softball College World Series were called into question a couple of times… enough that it was brought up in the media.

And now during the 2010 World Cup (after USA’s unfortunate departure), FIFA is coming under fire for their officiating.  Guess what?  They’re now considering high-tech solutions to solve their problems. 

So either a) officiators are somehow getting worse, b) the fans are getting more picky about their officiating, or c) the media doesn’t have anything better to cover.

My guess is that it’s a combination of b and c.

Quite simply, what’s happening now is that the men in blue are stuck in an era where there have been some high profile missed calls.  As a result, the spotlight is on them where is shouldn’t be.  You know an umpire is doing a good job when you don’t remember him and can’t recall his name.  THEN he’s doing his job. 

Now however, this issue is stuck in neutral and everyone is looking for the umpire to make a mistake.  And when he does, here come the typical articles in press/blogosphere… “SEE SEE!! We need to institute/expand instant replay!!”.

As I feel with most things in life, baseball should not make snap decisions based on high profile mistakes or media-driven policy. 

To me, it ain’t nothin till an ump calls it.

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Posted in: umpires by The Baseball Zealot
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Umpire Jim Joyce’s fateful call that blew Armando Galarraga’s perfect game on June 2 has most likely landed him on most top ten lists of Worst Calls by a sporting official.  However, that didn’t stop the players from voting him as baseball’s best umpire.

I’m a skeptical guy by nature, never accepting anything at face value.  Knowing this vote took place after the perfecto debacle, I have to think that one of these statements is true:

1. The players decided to band together and show true support for a good umpire who is going through a hard time because of a very bad call he made. 
2. A majority of players do really believe that Jim Joyce is the truly the best umpire out there regardless of the mistake he made.

I’m not in favor of skewing results of polls, surveys and such to push an agenda even if it seems a noble one but such as it is.  The truth is, Joyce has been around since 1987 and is considered one of the best.  He’s officiated one All-Star game, six Division Series, three League Championship Series and two World Series.  In short, he’s a seasoned veteran.

Consistent with their support of Joyce, an overwhelming 86% felt that the play at first base during Galarraga’s perfect game should NOT be overturned. 

Really?  I mean I can see the argument for either side but 86%!?

Other Results

The survey that the players took (100 players participated confidentially) had some other interesting results.  The worst umps?  CB Bucknor and Joe West.  West’s bad grade may be because he was also rated as having the “quickest hook”. 

Overall, the players weren’t so hot on the idea of instant replay.  On fair vs foul calls, only 36% were in favor.  When asked about replay for baserunning plays, it went down to 22%. 

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Posted in: umpires by The Baseball Zealot
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Here’s the most unique idea for a fantasy league I’ve heard in a while.  One based on MLB umpire ejections.

Billed as the MLB Umpire Ejection Fantasy League, this site documents all ejections by umpires in the majors and allows members to draft umps as you would a fantasy baseball team.  But as the name suggests, the stats are based on how many ejections the umpires are part of. 

Even if you aren’t a member, the blog is well worth the read if only for the useful/trivial? documentation of all the ejections that occur in baseball.

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Looks like baseball’s general managers weren’t interested about expanding the role of instant replay in baseball.  The topic wasn’t even brought up during their annual meeting on Tuesday.

"There are those who clamor for more and more instant replay," said Jimmie Lee Solomon, MLB executive vice president of baseball operations, "I think we need to digest what we’ve got. I know some (general managers) have talked off-line about the expansion of instant replay, but the commissioner (Bud Selig) doesn’t see any reason to consider it."

Good on them, I say.  Even if you favor the system, it’s too soon to rush into it because a few umps made some bad calls. 

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Posted in: Baseball Business by The Baseball Zealot
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As Yogi Berra once said, “It ain’t over till it’s over”.  And as my buddy Don, who is an Angel fan said late night, “If Brian Fuentes had walked Swisher, I think I would have jumped off my roof”. 

Fortunately for the Angels (and Don S), he didn’t.

I learned my lesson though.  I watched the game on TV at home till the beginning of the 7th.  John Lackey had been pitching brilliantly up until then and had a 4-0 lead.  Thinking that Big John had things well in hand, I decided to head to local coffee shop and watch the rest of the game on Gameday while I got some work done.

It’s a 6 block walk to the coffee shop and I was away from the game for 15 minutes, 20 tops.  Logging into Gameday, I was rudely greeted with a 7-6 Yankee lead.  Refreshing the browser didn’t seem to help. 

Looking back at it, I had a sneaking suspicion that Lackey was tiring.  Mid-inning, the camera crew show him in the dugout and boy, he really looked spent.  I remember commenting on that to my kid.

But thanks to a 3-run seventh fueled by back-to-back base hits by Guerrero and Morales, the Angels got back on top for the final score 7-6.

I’d like to say that was the end of the excitement but the Yankees made the Halos earn their pay Thursday night.  Angel reliever Brian Fuentes made things a little too interesting.  After a two-out, bases empty intentional pass to Alex Rodriguez, Fuentes followed that up with a Matsui walk and a Cano HBP to load the bases.  If that weren’t enough, Nick Swisher took him to a full count before popping out to short for third out to end the game. 

Fuentes line looked good.  One inning, no hits and a save.  But that sure didn’t tell the story of the game.  However, he got the job done.

The Angels got their miracle.  Three-Two sounds a whole lot better than Two-Zero or Three-One.

Other Postseason News:

• The MLB is panicking calmly reacting to the controversial calls that some of the umps have been making and readjusting the World Series lineup.  Is this a PR move or a logical move on their part?
• One analyst in, one analyst out.  ESPN’s Steve Phillips is taking an “extended leave of absence” after admitting to an affair with another ESPN worker. 
  Over at Fox Sports, they’ve decided to hire Sox manager Ozzie Guillen as a pre- and post game analyst for the World Series (The Baseball Zealot’s opinion:  Good on them… he’ll at least be interesting)
• Is MLB doing a little damage control?  The same day an article came out in the Washington Post entitled Phillies Want Shot at Yankees, MLB.com came out with an awkwardly titled article, Series Opponent Doesn’t Matter to Phillies.  Not that we as fans really care a whole lot but image is a big deal to Major League Baseball.

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Posted in: Postseason by The Baseball Zealot
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Interesting take on the quality of the umpiring lately…

From Fox Sports News:

While federal laws prohibit Major League Baseball from discussing injuries of employees, FOXsports.com has learned that the sidelined umpires include crew chiefs John Hirschbeck (testicular cancer), Charlie Reliford (back), Jerry Crawford (back), Tim Welke (concussion), Ed Montague (concussion and neck), Gary Darling (ankle and foot) and Rick Reed (stroke).

Other umpires who are sidelined by injuries include Kerwin Danley (concussion), Alfonso Marquez (back), Brian Runge (details unknown), Bill Hohn (back) and Ed Hickok (concussion).

Any umpire who makes the bigs is surely a quality product.  That said, these particular men in blue, especially Hirschbeck, Crawford, Montague, and Darling are the cream of the crop.  Ok, maybe Yankee fans might disagree with the Hirschbeck opinion. 

Not trying to excuse any of the mistakes and the whole angle of the story maybe just that, an angle dreamed up by the media.  But it IS an interesting take on the story.

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Posted in: Postseason by The Baseball Zealot
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I’ve never been a proponent of instant replay in baseball.  I’ve always felt that deep down, we should stick with the human element.  Like umpire Bill Klem once said, “It ain’t nothin’ till I call it”. 

But dang, some calls the umps are making recently are making it difficult to maintain my case.  There was the incident last Tuesday with Randy Marsh making a questionable call of Bobby Keppel’s pitch.  Did it hit Brandon Inge’s uni or not?  Marsh said no. 

Now, Minnesota Twins skipper Ron Gardenhire is floating the idea of a “red flag” now in response to an incorrect call of a Joe Mauer ground rule double on Friday night (it’s not the first time he’s brought this idea up.  He suggested it after a bad call in July). 

Gardenhire’s summary of the red flag proposal:

"I’ve said all along that I want a red flag," Gardenhire said in the Star-Tribune after the Cuddyer play. "If you use it and you’re wrong, you don’t get to use it the rest of the game. If you use it and you’re right, you get your red flag back and that would save a lot of money (for ejections)."

The red flag?  Bad idea.  But worse, it’s a only a natural extension of the current implementation of instant replay and one of the reasons I was against it in the first place. We’re just headed down that road now and there’s not a lot to stop us.

I don’t blame Gardenhire.  He’s gotta be pretty pissed.  But there’s one tenet I’ve always held to.  Whether it’s baseball, business, politcs or whatever, you never make policy decisions based on one particular incident.  It might look good now in the heat of the postseason and with the emotionally charged atmosphere of an admitted bad call but it needs to hold up to the test of time.

To his credit, Gardenhire did leave himself an out:

“(the) great thing about baseball is the human element, and we always want to keep it that way. We made enough mistakes ourselves and we missed opportunities to win the game. It just goes that way."

Maybe this red flag idea will just go away. 

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MLB Umpire Eric Cooper has had his share of Buehrle’s noteworthy pitching efforts.

How’s this for strange? (Umpire Eric) Cooper has been behind the plate for each of Buehrle’s last three shutouts — the perfect game Thursday, the no-hitter April 18, 2007, at U.S. Cellular Field against the Texas Rangers and a 6-0 victory against the Los Angeles Dodgers on June 17, 2005, at the Cell.

Hope Mark Buehrle isn’t superstitious… he might start putting in requests for Cooper for his future starts. 

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Posted in: pitchers by The Baseball Zealot
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I honestly couldn’t tell if Childs Walker was being sarcastic in his comments about instant replay via The Baltimore Sun.  (emphasis mine)

Instead, commissioner Bud Selig implemented limited replay as soon as he reached agreements with his players and umpires. If the technology saves even one blown call down the stretch this season, it was worth it.

Really?  Just one blown call saved would be worth it?  All the money spent to put this in place.  All the dissension from those who disagree with the policy? 

A little perspective, please.

Bill Klem would have something to say about that.

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Posted in: Baseball Business by The Baseball Zealot
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Todd, our resident umpire, passed on an email about an upcoming documentary that’s being filmed this season.  Entitled ‘Samurai Umpires in the USA’, the filmmaker, Takayuki Tanaka, is following the actions of the six Japanese umpires that are in the US professional baseball system right now.  All six are in the minors right now but of course, have aspirations to make it to the bigs someday.

The six Japanese umpires currently in the US minor league baseball system:

• Taro Hamano (Northwest League)
• Takeshi Hirabayashi (Southern League)
• Masaki Nonaka (California League)
• Atsushi Yoshioka (Arizona League)
• Yuta Niide (Pioneer League)
• Koyu Inoue (South Atlantic League)

‘Samurai Umpires’ will be a full-length feature film Most of the footage we’ll see will have been shot from July 2008 to end of the minor league season.

It looks like it won’t be a high budget film and perhaps not the most “polished” product.  For me, that’s a good thing.  We’ll get to see some raw footage rather than over-edited, perhaps contrived scenes.  That would be great.

Good luck to Mr Tanaka and I’m looking forward to seeing ‘Samurai Umpires’ when it comes out (target date is sometime next spring).

Here are a few news articles about the upcoming documentary “Samurai Umpires in the USA”:

MiLB.com:  ‘Samurai Umpires a major undertaking

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Posted in: Media by The Baseball Zealot
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