Galarraga and Joyce (split from OOTS)

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

I suspect the way in which Joyce and Armando handled the situation last night was the factor in him remaining in this series. Had it been ugly instead of classy, I believe they would have yanked him out of there.

[Zvon]

This situation can't be reversed imo.
I will also have a problem with MLB if it is.
Not that I'm over my last problem that robbed us all of a World Series.

Hey guys, I know that this guy has been ripped off of his place on the list of perfect game pitchers.
But we ALL know he pitched one.
He lost it to human error, like sometimes it goes in baseball.
And it wasn't a player and it was on the last out and.....

Doesn't this kinda make him more famous than anyone else on that list?
What happened to him had NEVER happened before in the history of the game.

Maybe he opens up a whole new category in baseball stats in this day and age.
Blown calls.
I doubt this one will ever be topped.

Seriously though, he certainly has now become a HUGE part of baseball lore and if I were him,
I might just be happy and content with that.

The game is what it is and these things happen.

[Gwreck]

I generally dislike Jayson Stark but the idea he was positing yesterday was for each manager to get one replay challenge per game. I don't see that as a problem.

[Willets Point]

And so the 28-out Perfect Game goes down in history with the Grand Slam Single.

[metirish]

What does Jeter think?

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

metirish wrote: What does Jeter think?

BINGO! that's the problem when you start overturning stuff. Can you imagine what would happen every time a call went against this weasel?

[Centerfield]

There are plenty of logistical problems to replay as well. For instance, what if a ball to the outfield is ruled a catch, but in fact, it's a single. Where do you send the runners? Does the baserunner on second get awarded the plate?

What if it's ruled a hit, but in fact, the outfielder caught it? That seems easier, everyone goes back to their base, but what if the runner would have been clearly doubled off?

[Guest holychicken]

Nymr83 wrote: wikipedia is like a big ugly message board where everyone wants to be hte first to post about something regardess of accuracy. if i were wikipedia i'd ban for life whoever added a "death date" for Joyce.

It is virtually as accurate as any other encyclopedia. the major difference is that when a discrepancy is brought up, it is fixed much more rapidly than any other. Also, it is, by far, the largest and most complete one out there.

Is it perfect? Certainly not. But I think it gets an unnecessarily bad rap when the reality of the situation is that it is probably the best encyclopedia there is.

Sorry for the OT.

But I am with Willets. I will remember this as the only 28 out perfect game in history.

What's the good of getting into the record books other than recognition, fame and going down in the history books? I can't name every other pitcher to throw a perfect game, but I have a feeling I will remember THIS perfect game by Galarraga for the rest of my life.

[HahnSolo]

Zvon wrote: Hey guys, I know that this guy has been ripped off of his place on the list of perfect game pitchers. But we ALL know he pitched one. He lost it to human error, like sometimes it goes in baseball. And it wasn't a player and it was on the last out and..... Doesn't this kinda make him more famous than anyone else on that list? What happened to him had NEVER happened before in the history of the game.

We all know he pitched one right now. But memories and history can be a little funny. Maybe history will treat him like Harvey Haddix, remembered for extended greatness before eventually falling short. But perhaps his name will become an asterisk to the story, if more people remember the name Jim Joyce.

I am sure there were plenty of heroes for the Royals in game 6 of 1985, but I don't remember any of them. I do remember Don Denkinger, though. I think one of the Iorg brothers was involved in the final play, but I'd have to look it up.

[Guest Edgy DC]

I think an important part of the Haddix legend was that he stuck around for a while, with a 17-ish-year career and many many years as a big league pitching coach. For decades, the camera would pass him by sitting on a big-league bench and the broadcaster would recount the story for the umpteenth time.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Babe Ruth is another pitcher who pitched a perfect game that didn't count. (Because his was as a relief pitcher. The starter's name, I think, was Ernie Shaw.)

Of course, there's no way to be sure the feat would be as legendary if the pitcher was a much lesser-known player. But I think it would be remembered anyway. Most fans know of Johnny Van Der Meer, and his overall career wasn't all that.

[metirish]

Selig says no.

[Frayed Knot]

Benjamin Grimm wrote: Babe Ruth is another pitcher who pitched a perfect game that didn't count. (Because his was as a relief pitcher. The starter's name, I think, was Ernie Shaw.)

Actually I believe it was the other way around.
Ruth started, walked the first batter, and then got his ass ejected for disputing one of the calls. Shaw came in the relieve, the runner was caught stealing (or picked off) and Shaw went on the get the next 26 batters.

There were a whole bunch of quasi no-hitters which were erased by a committee some 20 years back. The Ruth/Shaw game was one of them. The most notable was the Harvey Haddix gem which he lost in the (13th?) inning on an error, an IW, and a HR-turned-2B. Because Haddix didn't finish the game with no hits allowed it was ruled neither a no-hitter nor a perfect game even though he was perfect thru 12.

[Zvon]

HahnSolo wrote: Zvon wrote: Hey guys, I know that this guy has been ripped off of his place on the list of perfect game pitchers. But we ALL know he pitched one. He lost it to human error, like sometimes it goes in baseball. And it wasn't a player and it was on the last out and..... Doesn't this kinda make him more famous than anyone else on that list? What happened to him had NEVER happened before in the history of the game. We all know he pitched one right now. But memories and history can be a little funny. Maybe history will treat him like Harvey Haddix, remembered for extended greatness before eventually falling short. But perhaps his name will become an asterisk to the story, if more people remember the name Jim Joyce. I am sure there were plenty of heroes for the Royals in game 6 of 1985, but I don't remember any of them. I do remember Don Denkinger, though. I think one of the Iorg brothers was involved in the final play, but I'd have to look it up.

Point well taken.

[Benjamin Grimm]

That's right. Ruth was the starter, and Shaw, or Shore, was the 9-perfect-inning reliever.

[ashie62]

metirish wrote: Selig says no.

Sometimes one has to do what is right, even if it sets a precedent. Bud, F U

[metirish]

CNBC numb-nut

http://deadspin.com/5554891/unrelated-baseball-matter-leads-to-casual-misogyny-at-cnbc

[metsmarathon]

i find it maddening that baseball "purists" are falling all over themselves trying to defend and protect and reinforce the "human element" of baseball officiating. i'd like to rebrand them "errorists" or "inaccurists" in this regard.

the reason we accept human error in baseball officiating is because we are forced to, as for 150 years or so, humans were the best thing we could come up with to judge the events on the field against the criteria set forth in the rule book. humans, being inherently imperfect, are expected to make mistakes at times. yet we still ask, nay, demand of them to strive towards perfection. do we not demand of our umpires to get the maximum number of calls correct?

and isn't what distinguishes baseball officiating from officiating in most other major sports that there are virtually no judgment calls - that everything is either black or it is white - with the possible exception of the declaring the applicability of the infield fly rule, or whether a player left the basepaths to disrupt the defense?

balls and strikes - either the ball is within the imaginary box, or it is not. safe or out - either the batter beat the ball to the bag, or he did not. fair or foul - either the ball is on this side of the line, or it is not. catch or trap - either the ball hit the glove first, or the ground.

there's no "gee, did he touch the other player too hard, or not? did he grab his jersey but not yank too hard, or let go quickly enough? was that kick to the groin or slapshot to the face really just incidental?"

if baseball could eliminate the potential for the officials to make mistakes, would not that be the most pure form of the sport - you go out there and play, and your actions alone determine the outcome? if baseball could eliminate the umpires, and the calls could be made instantly, accurately, and automatically, would that really be an abomination, or would it be more perfectly capturing the intended function of the umpires?

more to the point, there is already precedent established whereby instant replay can be used. i'm not talking about the boundary calls on home runs. the umpires are already allowed to request assistance in making a call from their peers, and in fact may consider arguments made by the players on the field and other uniformed personnel such as the manager and base coaches. and if a sufficient case is made, the umpire is permitted to reverse his call, and even make a determination on where the baserunners should be positioned as a result of teh modified outcome of the play. there is also precedent for adding additional umpires to the field of play, as in teh playoffs we add a pair of umpires down teh lines for the express purpose of calling home runs (fair foul, too? i forget..)

so how is that appreciably different than installing a fifth umpire who is able to reinforce or overturn calls made on teh field when sufficient evidence is presented? i've gotta say that 99% of the questionable calls can be resolved by the television broadcasters before teh next pitch is made. why cannot a fifth umpire, with his ever-watching eye, also have a hi-def terminal with multiple simultaneous camera angles available to him to make a rapid assessment of the accuracy of a call in question? if he can't resolve the matter in 30 seconds, the call on teh field stands.

and i don't know why that should serve to undermine the authority of teh umpires. in the case of the imperfect game, joyce himself has stated that he made an error, and wishes he could reverse the call. and how often does a call look blown in real time, but then on instant replay, teh tv crew is amazed that the umpire was actually able to get it right?

when the home plate umpire asks for a ruling from the first base umpire on a check swing, does that undermine his authority to call that same play unassisted? how is that any different, except that all of a sudden there'd be technology involved?

[ashie62]

Gallaraga's game was pure. He misses the opportunity to have the ball go to the HOF and likely misses some memorabilia earning power post-career.

[Guest themetfairy]

Ashie62 wrote: Gallaraga's game was pure. He misses the opportunity to have the ball go to the HOF and likely misses some memorabilia earning power post-career.

Actually, I think his earning power has just gone up tremendously. Everybody loves how he handled the situation with such class. I think this is going to translate into endorsements and will serve him well in future contract negotiations.

I told my husband last night that his agent must be in heaven right now, because this kid is totally marketable.

[MFS62]

themetfairy wrote: Ashie62 wrote: Gallaraga's game was pure. He misses the opportunity to have the ball go to the HOF and likely misses some memorabilia earning power post-career. Actually, I think his earning power has just gone up tremendously. Everybody loves how he handled the situation with such class. I think this is going to translate into endorsements and will serve him well in future contract negotiations. I told my husband last night that his agent must be in heaven right now, because this kid is totally marketable.

Plus, baseball fans have long memories of weird stuff like this.
I'd bet Harvey Haddix is still remembered for his 13 inning "non-perfect game" over 50 years ago more than some of the pitchers who pitched a perfecto since then.

Later

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Also... there's not a chance the HOF doesn't get his ball in its hall. This is the Merkle-y, Bartman-y stuff from which baseball lore is made.

[batmagadanleadoff]

metsmarathon wrote: i find it maddening that baseball "purists" are falling all over themselves trying to defend and protect and reinforce the "human element" of baseball officiating. i'd like to rebrand them "errorists" or "inaccurists" in this regard.

Yesterday afternoon I was in my car driving and I put on the "FAN", thinking that perhaps, the station might be carrying the Buffalo game because Strasburg was pitching. Instead, the station was broadcasting its normal programming, which at that moment was Mike Francesca. Mike was browbeating some caller-in who thought that MLB should institute some form of replay. Francesca's argument (harangue, really) against replay was based entirely on the premise that Mike was comfortable with the current state of things. "I'm fine with the way things are" said Mike. And that was that. It was the Mikey Likes It defense.

[Willets Point]

I like metsmarathon's take on this, especially this part:

so how is that appreciably different than installing a fifth umpire who is able to reinforce or overturn calls made on teh field when sufficient evidence is presented? i've gotta say that 99% of the questionable calls can be resolved by the television broadcasters before teh next pitch is made. why cannot a fifth umpire, with his ever-watching eye, also have a hi-def terminal with multiple simultaneous camera angles available to him to make a rapid assessment of the accuracy of a call in question? if he can't resolve the matter in 30 seconds, the call on teh field stands.

That resolves a lot of the "delay-of-game/momentum" objections. In fact I've long thought the NFL should have a specified video replay referee instead of having a guy on the field go off and look in that little monitor window. A video replay umpire in a soundproof booth communicating with the on-field umpires by a cellphone and making quick decisions on contested calls sounds like an acceptable idea to me. I'm down with tradition but I don't think that we should also accept errors just because of tradition.

[batmagadanleadoff]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: i find it maddening that baseball "purists" are falling all over themselves trying to defend and protect and reinforce the "human element" of baseball officiating. i'd like to rebrand them "errorists" or "inaccurists" in this regard. Yesterday afternoon I was in my car driving and I put on the "FAN", thinking that perhaps, the station might be carrying the Buffalo game because Strasburg was pitching. Instead, the station was broadcasting its normal programming, which at that moment was Mike Francesca. Mike was browbeating some caller-in who thought that MLB should institute some form of replay. Francesca's argument (harangue, really) against replay was based entirely on the premise that Mike was comfortable with the current state of things. "I'm fine with the way things are" said Mike. And that was that. It was the Mikey Likes It defense.

I just remembered Francesca mocking that caller by repeating like three or four times in a row: "Whaddya want? Robots? You want Robots? Robots? Is that what you want?"

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: I just remembered Francesca mocking that caller by repeating like three or four times in a row: "Whaddya want? Robots? You want Robots? Robots? Is that what you want?"

Holy crap. Yes. Yes, I want robots.

Baseball is a sport whose appeal has been inextricably wrapped up with nostalgia for the better part of fifty years, right? (I mean, hell... what do WE sit around doing on off days here?) The Francesas and "human-apologists" are just a few of the flies buzzing around the hardcore traditionalist poop pile. Sentimentalists may like the human factor*, but public sentiment increasingly leans toward the rise of the machines. Nice assaying, marathon.

*And criminy-- we're not talking about "smoothing" visible brushstrokes in the Mona Lisa or making the Pieta more anatomically/physically correct. We're talking about not going by "feel" on when the game clock buzzer went off in relation to the game-winning basketball shot, or-- maybe more to the point-- not adjuticating the race between fastest-humans-alive by eyeballin' it.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

I'm with Mike, you know, not about Robots or whatever, but that I like having games called by people, who are as a part of the game as anyone. Certainly better than an equally obnoxious Michael Kay who yesterday was all sweaty over DOING THE RIGHT THING.

I think this guy has good take on it:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/josh-wilker/defending-mistakes_b_600559.html

Josh Wilker Author of Cardboard Gods: An All-American Tale Told Through Baseball Cards Posted: June 4, 2010 10:03 AM Defending Mistakes I dread the inevitable. I was going to say "I dread the inevitable expansion of instant replay in major league baseball" (inevitable because of the watershed moment earlier this week of Jim Joyce's blown call of what should have been the last out in Armando Galarraga's attempt to pitch a perfect game), but I decided to stop and insert a period after the first four words because they seemed to have accidentally, perhaps you could say mistakenly, hit on a greater personal truth beyond the more pointed thesis I intended to hammer home with terse, manly, bracing clarity today. I'll get to the expanded version of my intended opening sentence in a moment, I hope, but first let me digress (for digressing is the closest I'll ever get to finding a refuge from doom) and say that I dread the inevitable. I dread the end. I dread the unstoppable march toward the end. I wish I could press a button and stop time. But you can't stop time and you can't even really digress much these days, because who wants to sit around reading long, looping, allusive sentences that suddenly veer off target to reach for things that are lost for good, like one of the mushy baseballs my brother and I used to buy at the general store down the road and then knock into the tall baseball-eating grass where our sheep grazed (Virginia was her name, and she was in some ways the symbolic center of my family's 1970s back-to-the-land dream, which eventually failed [symbolically ending the day Virginia came home in little white packages that everyone was too sad to ever eat] and in failing became eligible to be deemed, in retrospect, a mistake, perhaps even something to have been avoided, had there been some technological, time-stopping means of doing so), the loss of one of the mushy balls always seeming like the product of some mistake that disabled our flimsy two-boy game and opened us back up to the fading of the light from the sky, the end of the day, the march of time, the inevitable -- I mean who wants to get involved in that kind of melancholy textual aimlessness these days what with all the other quick-hitting entertainment opportunities available? So enough! I came here not to waste precious time but to argue! Specifically! About something! And that something is the inevitable expansion of the use of instant replay in major league baseball! Only a moron and/or a societal outcast could argue against the inevitable expansion of the use of instant replay in major league baseball at this point, given the evidence in favor of such an expansion provided by the historically freighted judgment call that the human in the position of authority, Jim Joyce, got wrong. But I guess I am that moron and/or societal outcast. Something about the profoundly boring and predictable nature of the uproar over the event, and the uproar-fueling media-led mob-march toward legislating in rules to make everything smooth as an android's skin, has me wanting to argue in defense of mistakes. Maybe mistakes are our only divergence from the inevitable. I mean, in the vastness of barren space, this tiny blue globe of vibrant life stands out as a brief, inexplicable mistake. And everywhere on this earth, mistakes key strange, unexpected growth. Jazz singer Jon Hendricks once said, "It wouldn't be jazz without the mistakes." Christopher Columbus found this continent by mistake. Judging from my mother and father's separation from one another in the 1970s, a separation that suggested the original coupling was a bad call, my very existence was the product of a mistake. My parents' attempt during that mistake-filled decade to establish a utopian life in the country, in which we would grow all our own food, also proved to be untenable, another mistake, though I trace the deepest loves and joys and hopes of my life to the love and joy and hope embedded in that mistake. In the years of that continuous mistake, my childhood, I poured myself into baseball, absorbing a vast colorful world not through telecasts of games stripped clean of mistakes but through homely, error-pocked baseball cards and through books and through static-ridden radio broadcasts of games and through numbers and through my own weedy, distorting imagination. Thusly, baseball got into my bones, mistakes and all, and grew to the point where I can't tell where my own self ends and baseball begins. But if, or when, baseball games begin to resemble the drudgery of professional football -- brief moments of action giving way constantly to officials gathered around a video monitor -- I will finally know where I end and where a slicker, more sterile version of my favorite game begins. And I don't want to know where I end.

[metirish]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: batmagadanleadoff wrote: i find it maddening that baseball "purists" are falling all over themselves trying to defend and protect and reinforce the "human element" of baseball officiating. i'd like to rebrand them "errorists" or "inaccurists" in this regard. Yesterday afternoon I was in my car driving and I put on the "FAN", thinking that perhaps, the station might be carrying the Buffalo game because Strasburg was pitching. Instead, the station was broadcasting its normal programming, which at that moment was Mike Francesca. Mike was browbeating some caller-in who thought that MLB should institute some form of replay. Francesca's argument (harangue, really) against replay was based entirely on the premise that Mike was comfortable with the current state of things. "I'm fine with the way things are" said Mike. And that was that. It was the Mikey Likes It defense. I just remembered Francesca mocking that caller by repeating like three or four times in a row: "Whaddya want? Robots? You want Robots? Robots? Is that what you want?"

I heard him , maybe it was the same caller.......Francesa was all belligerent with this one caller who's opening gambit was fuel to Frances'a fire...." I think you're totally wrong on this Mike and I'll tell you why"......" WAS HE SAFE OR OUT....HUH....HUH...YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT....THERE'S NO MECHANISM IN BASEBALL TO CHANGE THE CALL......I'M ASKING YOU, WAS HE SAFE AT FIRST OR OUT?....."ah , Mike , you really think he was safe?"......" WELL WAS HE CALLED SAFE...HUH ....HUH..."


It was hilarious...

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Maybe mistakes are our only divergence from the inevitable. I mean, in the vastness of barren space, this tiny blue globe of vibrant life stands out as a brief, inexplicable mistake. And everywhere on this earth, mistakes key strange, unexpected growth. Jazz singer Jon Hendricks once said, "It wouldn't be jazz without the mistakes." Christopher Columbus found this continent by mistake. Judging from my mother and father's separation from one another in the 1970s, a separation that suggested the original coupling was a bad call, my very existence was the product of a mistake. My parents' attempt during that mistake-filled decade to establish a utopian life in the country, in which we would grow all our own food, also proved to be untenable, another mistake, though I trace the deepest loves and joys and hopes of my life to the love and joy and hope embedded in that mistake.

I like Josh Wilker, and I can fall into one of his paragraphs for a day or so.

But this is a gigantic load of horseplop. We're not talking about eliminating sidearm pitchers, or forcing all batters to stand the exact same way in the box. We're not talking-- in other words-- about eliminating jazz or the miracle of life; we're talking about eliminating something tantamount to dumb, unfair loopholes in the tax code that have somehow managed to survive several decades. We're talking about tightening up rules and regulations so as to ensure their even execution.

Those who wax poetic over the joyous mistake would be best served to remember that the overwhelming majority of mistakes made in this world end up serving those involved rather poorly. The "happy accident" is notable because it's so rare.

Edited June 4, 2010 by Guest

[G-Fafif]

I want m.e.t.b.o.t. to be the final arbiter of all close calls.