There is nothing like one good bad call to bring out the best and worst in people.
After the perfect game that was — and it was — posted by Detroit Tigers’ pitcher Armando Galarraga wound up being foiled on perhaps the worst call in baseball history, fans were first outraged and then overcome by the emotion — and accountability — the spewed forth from umpire Jim Joyce.
Joyce bawled his eyes out over the dreadful safe call at first on what should have been the 27th out of the ball game and while many people sympathized with Joyce, others looked at the replay and said, “How in God’s name did he miss that call? It wasn’t even close.”
Then along came Bud Selig who could have fixed it all just by doing the right thing, but as we noted, it’s understandable why he made the stupid decision he did. Ol’ Bud gets all frothy over the “human element” in baseball and didn’t have the cojones to simply overturn the call and give Galarraga the 21st perfect game in baseball history.
Perhaps Bud was just trying to punish Joyce who will have to live with the worst call in baseball history for the rest of his life. Or perhaps Bud was just being Bud, a weak commissioner who will talk about replay and improving the umpiring, but will probably do nothing at all.
As they say, baseball is successful despite the people who run it.
Back here in Paradise, it rained most of the week, we slogged around the wet basement, eventually got it dry and still had enough time to watch the silly world of sports and media. It’s a strange, strange place, as evidenced by…
1) The Philadelphia Flyers are destined to make a series out of the Stanley Cup final. Two big wins back in Philly — in two very good hockey games — have the Flyers and Chicago BlackHawks deadlocked at 2-2 heading back to Chicago for Game 5 on Sunday night.
Historically, the Stanley Cup final is about great goaltending. In this series, there isn’t a decent goaltender to be found. Every game is a netminding adventure and one gets the sense a fluke or a bad goal will be the deciding factor.
2) The Winnipeg Blue Bombers had better win the Grey Cup this year. If they don’t, the local media might all have a collective heart attack.
The media cheerleading for the Bombers started this week and it’s only rookie camp. If new head coach Paul LaPolice doesn’t win his first half-dozen games, the scribes with their short skirts and pom-poms won’t be able to backpedal fast enough.
3) It’s rather sad that so many important people in baseball don’t want instant replay. They keep making the same old, used-up arguments about errors being part of the game and how important the human element is.
They’re idiots. They believe the wrong answer is a good thing. Replay has done nothing but good for football and hockey. Even basketball uses it from time-to-time and baseball’s experiment with home runs has been perfect.
And yet muttonheads throughout baseball still believe the “human element” is good for the game.
No sport needs replay more than baseball. From the 2009 playoffs until Joyce’s shit-kicking of that call at first on Wednesday night, major league baseball umpiring has been sickeningly bad (a big ball fan at the Goldeyes game Friday night said, “C.B. Bucknor should not be allowed on a ball field.”).
Join the 20th Century gentlemen. It was really nice back then. Find a way to use replay and the heartache felt by far too many people on Wednesday night will never be felt again.
4) The world’s media went ape shit this week when Cote d’Ivoire superstar Didier Drogba broke his arm. Headlines flared: “Drogba Out of World Cup.”
This week, the Cote d’Ivoire medical team said Drogba was likely to play “some or all of World Cup 2010.” The Elephants don’t open until June 15 and there was one other important thing to note. It was his freakin’ arm. It’s soccer. You can’t even use your freakin’ arm.
NFL and CFL linemen often play a much tougher game with broken arms, wrists and hands almost as a matter of course. New Bomber quarterback Buck Pirece has played when he didn’t even know what province he was in. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Drogba in Cote d’Ivoire’s opener. Put an aspirin on it.