Worst call of my lifetime

[reinko]

No error.  Just an infield single.  According to the ump (before he watched the replay), the hitter beat the throw.  This is not an error.

Why is it scored though as a base hit and an error? 

http://scores.espn.go.com/mlb/scoreboard

http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/scoreboard/20100602?tag=pageRow;pageContainer

[State Street Warrior]

Why is it scored though as a base hit and an error? 

http://scores.espn.go.com/mlb/scoreboard

http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/scoreboard/20100602?tag=pageRow;pageContainer

It isn't, the error was made by the Indians that is why it is on their line.  Why would that even look like Detroit had an error.  Box scores are read by what that team has done so in this case: Cleveland had zero runs.  Cleveland had "1" hit.  Cleveland had 1 error.  Meaning they made the error.

[reinko]

It isn't, the error was made by the Indians that is why it is on their line.  Why would that even look like Detroit had an error.  Box scores are read by what that team has done so in this case: Cleveland had zero runs.  Cleveland had "1" hit.  Cleveland had 1 error.  Meaning they made the error.

[Benny B]

If this is a reference to Don Dekinger (sp?), I think you mean that Bud should award the Cardinals the World Series. KC benefitted from the blown call.

Awarding Galarraga the perfect game would be a joke and a disgrace to the game and it would totally undermind the umpires. Are they going to go back and overrule every missed call throughout every game after the fact? What if a blown call actually costs someone a win? Should they overturn those calls too? It's a shame what happened and Galarraga should have had a perfect game...but it didn't work out.

In 1972 Milt Pappas of the Cubs had retired 26 straight and had a 2-2 count on the 27th batter. The next two pitches were over the plate but called balls by Bruce Froemming and he lost the perfect game (but finished the no-no). Should Selig review the tape using Ques-tec and award Pappas a perfecto if appropriate?

In Kerry Wood's 20 K game, the only hit he allowed was a bleeder that was botched by Kevin Orie but ruled a hit. Should they go back, call it an error and award Wood a no-hitter 12 years after the fact?

I realize those aren't exactly the same, but if you overturn one call, like Chico said, it really opens up Pandora's box.

Wrong, wrong, and wrong.

Dekinger didn't win or lose the series for anyone.  Both teams had opportunities before and after the blown call.  Even if you want to believe Dek is responsible for the Cardinals demise, his call was to the detriment of the entire team.  Jim Joyce's call did not affect the outcome of the game -- the Tigers still won -- it affected two players - Galarraga and Donald.  Different situation.

Calling a strike a ball (or vice versa) is a completely different call.  If you took a freeze-frame of a pitch "on the black" from an umpire's POV and asked every major league umpire "ball or strike?" I guarantee that you won't get a unanimous decision.  You show every umpire last nights call, and I guarantee you will get a unanimous decision.  The Pappas argument is weak.  Plus, that was 1972... good luck getting any footage that definitively proves ball or strike.

Kerry Wood's 20K game was a scoring decision, and the scorekeeper stood by his decision.  Jim Joyce admitted he was wrong, but unlike a scorekeeper, he doesn't have 24 hours to change his decision.  Again -- completely different situation.

Too many people worried about this Pandora character and her box.  Nobody in baseball will complain if Bud Selig reverses this call.  The standings won't change.  Who wins the World Series won't change.  Nobody's salary is going to change (I'm sure the the "perfecto" will be considered a perfecto in A.G.'s future contract negotiations).  I'm sure Donald will be happy to have the 'hit' removed from his stat line.  Nothing changes, except that A.G. is returned what is rightfully his.  I'm sure Pandora would agree.

[ChicosBailBonds]

I think Dan Patrick stated it well this morning about Pandora.   You are right that it doesn't change who won or lost, it is simply a personal achievement.

But what happens, as Dan states, when the same type of blown call does cost a team a win?  What if it's a playoff game?  You're going to have people saying a precedent has been made to overturn a blown call in instance (simply to correct a Perfect game), but you're unwilling to overturn a blown call in an even more important instance (determining the actual winner).  At the end of the day, the object of the game is to WIN THE GAME.

Peter Gammons, this morning, went down the same path.

Neither was outright against overturning it, but both made very strong comments about Pandora's box (slippery slope, dangerous precedent, etc) that will come about.  The law of unintended consequences.

[TallTitan34]

This is why I have mixed feelings about it.

Nobody in baseball will complain if Bud Selig reverses this call.  The standings won't change.  Who wins the World Series won't change.  Nobody's salary is going to change (I'm sure the the "perfecto" will be considered a perfecto in A.G.'s future contract negotiations).  I'm sure Donald will be happy to have the 'hit' removed from his stat line.  Nothing changes, except that A.G. is returned what is rightfully his.  I'm sure Pandora would agree.

This is why I have mixed feelings.  It does open pandora's box, however, all it really does is give Galaraga his well deserved accomplishment.

I think situations like this are exactly why the "best interest of baseball" clause was created.

[StillAWarrior]

I would really like for Galarraga to have his perfect game, but I just don't think they can should do that.  My personal opinion.  YMMV.


Fixed.

[ChicosBailBonds]

This is why I have mixed feelings about it.
This is why I have mixed feelings.  It does open pandora's box, however, all it really does is give Galaraga his well deserved accomplishment.

I think situations like this are exactly why the "best interest of baseball" clause was created.

But aren't the best interest of baseball to get the winner and loser right, even MORE SO?  I think that's where Pandora's box is wide open.  A blown call in a game that determines a winner or loser, seems to me the best interest of baseball should be to get it right, too. 

[State Street Warrior]

So Joyce is behind the plate today, good thing the perfect game today got broken up on the 5th hitter with a single.  Somehow I imagined a controversy somewhere in the 3rd-5th inning with a questionable full count walk/strikeout to preserve or ruin a perfect game.

[tower912]

Galarragga brought out the lineup cards, Joyce was visibly weeping, Galaragga reached over and patted him on the back, Joyce punched him in the shoulder, and it was over.    Standing O and a new Corvette convertible for Armando. 

[MUBurrow]

i dont think theres any way that Selig or anyone else should overrule the call. If for no other reason because baseball foresaw this kind of thing happening!! for years now, there have been calls for instant replay, etc and mlb has always scoffed at the idea. now you can argue the merits of that, but the point is that they specifically refer to human error as part of the game.  the history, prestige, etc is preserved when you dont use video monitoring in baseball because out/safe, ball/strike, etc is a judgment call meant to be made by fallible umpires.  to simply ignore the years and years in which mlb has cited human error as a necessary part of baseball because the call becomes more or less important would be cowardice.  i actually sort of like the preservation of judgment calls and no video replay in baseball, so take this FWIW.  however from mlb's standpoint, they might as well have specifically written into the rules that "reply should not be used to grant a perfect game where it was robbed by human error."

[bma725]

Pandora's box was opened almost 20 years ago when Fay Vincent's stupid committee on statistical accuracy decided to change the definition of a no hitter and retroactively remove 50 of them from the record book.  If they can do that, this should be a cake walk.

[MerrittsMustache]

Wrong, wrong, and wrong.

Dekinger didn't win or lose the series for anyone.  Both teams had opportunities before and after the blown call.  Even if you want to believe Dek is responsible for the Cardinals demise, his call was to the detriment of the entire team.  Jim Joyce's call did not affect the outcome of the game -- the Tigers still won -- it affected two players - Galarraga and Donald.  Different situation.

Calling a strike a ball (or vice versa) is a completely different call.  If you took a freeze-frame of a pitch "on the black" from an umpire's POV and asked every major league umpire "ball or strike?" I guarantee that you won't get a unanimous decision.  You show every umpire last nights call, and I guarantee you will get a unanimous decision.  The Pappas argument is weak.  Plus, that was 1972... good luck getting any footage that definitively proves ball or strike.

Kerry Wood's 20K game was a scoring decision, and the scorekeeper stood by his decision.  Jim Joyce admitted he was wrong, but unlike a scorekeeper, he doesn't have 24 hours to change his decision.  Again -- completely different situation.

Too many people worried about this Pandora character and her box.  Nobody in baseball will complain if Bud Selig reverses this call.  The standings won't change.  Who wins the World Series won't change.  Nobody's salary is going to change (I'm sure the the "perfecto" will be considered a perfecto in A.G.'s future contract negotiations).  I'm sure Donald will be happy to have the 'hit' removed from his stat line.  Nothing changes, except that A.G. is returned what is rightfully his.  I'm sure Pandora would agree.

The point I was making (that you clearly missed) was that it would be hard to change this one call while ignoring the countless other examples of similar situations AND there's no clear-cut place to draw the line unless you want to say it's only applicable to a blown call on the last out of a perfect game. What if this same call was made in the 3rd inning? It wouldn't have been any less wrong but if he was the only batter to reach, using your logic, the call shold be reversed and a perfect game should be rewarded. What happens when a bad call actually does cost a team a game? Will MLB overturn that call and the outcome of the game? It just gets too complicated.

[4everwarriors]

Tell me more about this Pandora chick and her box you speak of.

[ZiggysFryBoy]

I'm a big fan of Pandora's box.....

[ChicosBailBonds]

Pandora's box was opened almost 20 years ago when Fay Vincent's stupid committee on statistical accuracy decided to change the definition of a no hitter and retroactively remove 50 of them from the record book.  If they can do that, this should be a cake walk.

That's quite different than deciding when to overturn calls and when not.  What I think I'm hearing some people here say is, it's ok to overturn THIS call because a guy lost a perfect game.  But it's not ok to overturn a call that actually would determine the winner and loser.  WTF

And for the record, I'm 100% in agreement with you BMA on the no hitter BS that the MLB did years ago.  But having worked for a MLB team and still very close to it, the word "shocking" has never appeared in my vocabulary with any decisions that come down from them, especially with the current regime and Bud Lite.

[ChicosBailBonds]

[Mayor McCheese]

Bad Call... Ump understands this


And no, Instant Replay should not be in baseball... ruins the nostalgic feeling baseball has, what would be the use of umps then, just use computers... kills the pasttime which is baseball

[Benny B]

The point I was making (that you clearly missed) was that it would be hard to change this one call while ignoring the countless other examples of similar situations AND there's no clear-cut place to draw the line unless you want to say it's only applicable to a blown call on the last out of a perfect game. What if this same call was made in the 3rd inning? It wouldn't have been any less wrong but if he was the only batter to reach, using your logic, the call shold be reversed and a perfect game should be rewarded. What happens when a bad call actually does cost a team a game? Will MLB overturn that call and the outcome of the game? It just gets too complicated.

No, I understood your point completely.  My point is that the examples you threw out are not similar situations.  If it happened in the third inning, you cannot overturn the call because the entire dynamic of the game changes at that point.  Every action has a random consequence.  There's no way to predict what happens after that.

But this was supposed to be the last play of the game.  If the call was made correctly, the game is over.  There is no chance for anything subsequent to change.  In this case, you can change the call and right a wrong with confidence.  You can't do that when a call is blown in the middle of a game.

Overturn the call -- nothing like this has ever happened before so you're not going against precedent.  And start allowing replay on the very last play of a game -- nothing like this will ever happen again.  If there's nothing inside Pandora's box, who cares whether it's open or not?

[TallTitan34]

It's been announced Bud Selig will not overturn the call on the field.

I've blasted him at length on these message boards but I'd like to give him props for making the right call.

[GOMU1104]

It's been announced Bud Selig will not overturn the call on the field.

I've blasted him at length on these message boards but I'd like to give him props for making the right call.

Honestly, when I saw you replied to this topic I immediately said "here we go..."

As vehemently Selig is against instant replay...I think this, coupled with what happened in the playoffs last year, will lead to some changes. 

I am in favor of an expanded system for the playoffs only...those games are too important to be screwed up by blatant missed calls.

[Mayor McCheese]

Honestly, when I saw you replied to this topic I immediately said "here we go..."

As vehemently Selig is against instant replay...I think this, coupled with what happened in the playoffs last year, will lead to some changes. 

I am in favor of an expanded system for the playoffs only...those games are too important to be screwed up by blatant missed calls.

My question to you... does one play really make a game?

For instance, if a blown call is made, does that really change the game.  Sure I guess in hindsight it might, but youve got 9 innings, 27 outs, you can never blame a blown call for a loss.  Play through it, you've done it your whole life, should be no different.

[g0lden3agle]

Bad Call... Ump understands this


And no, Instant Replay should not be in baseball... ruins the nostalgic feeling baseball has, what would be the use of umps then, just use computers... kills the pasttime which is baseball

Sometimes nostalgia needs to make way for progress.  There is nothing wrong with having some sort of NFL-like replay system in play where each team gets a challenge or two for an entire game.

[mu03eng]

Bad Call... Ump understands this


And no, Instant Replay should not be in baseball... ruins the nostalgic feeling baseball has, what would be the use of umps then, just use computers... kills the pasttime which is baseball

And there is a problem when the nostalgia gets in the way of winning and keeping fans.  The game has to adapt, not only on this issue but the length of the games.  As a Red Sox fan, I want to slit my wrists anytime Manny Delcarmen pitches relief, just to prove the point I could bleed to death in the time it takes him to throw twice.  This highlights baseball's unwillingness to at least move forward a century and peak the interest of a younger generation.  I guarantee you baseball is hemorrhaging fans because they won't update the game.

[StillAWarrior]

Sometimes nostalgia needs to make way for progress.  There is nothing wrong with having some sort of NFL-like replay system in play where each team gets a challenge or two for an entire game.

Just curious...if there was replay and if Detroit already had used their allotted challenge(s), then this result would stand?  Or would there be umpire challenges too?  Or could the Commish overturn in the next day?  Or would Cleveland have just gone ahead and used one of its challenges to the benefit of Galarraga?