Well, no secret what this is about. Last night, and into the wee hours of the morning, our Buccos and the Braves played 19 innings and nearly seven grueling hours of baseball. And just like back in '92 the fate of both teams came down to a play at the plate. Only this time, the scapegoat is a man named Jerry, not Barry. Umpire Jerry Meals made what was perhaps the worst call in Major League Baseball history, literally. That's not an exaggeration. I don't have to provide the setting or tell you the story. By now, everyone in the country either watched in person, like me, or has seen it on ESPN today.
For those of us who stayed up until about 2:30 am, it was utterly infuriating. For about the last two hours of the game, I just wanted it to end so I could go to bed. When it finally did, I was so irate I couldn't sleep. I realize I'm just a fan watching on TV, but even I felt cheated. Bucs manager Clint Hurdle said it best, "The game deserved better." He's absolutely right. That particular game, as well as the game of baseball in general deserves better.
First I want to discuss the umpire's decision. I don't care if Meals was 100% certain that Mike McKenry missed the swipe tag on Julio Lugo, in professional baseball when the ball beats the runner by 15 feet, he is called out. I have never, on any level, seen a runner thrown out by that much and be called safe. Unless Lugo made some miraculous slide to avoid the tag, which he didn't considering the tag was applied at least five feet from home plate, the runner is out strictly on principle. I'm sure Meals made what he thought was the right call. I believe him that he thought the Fort missed the tag, but for God's sake let common sense prevail. Especially in that situation. We are down to the bare bones on the bench and in the pen. It's down to who is tougher, who is going to budge first... Neither team did, yet we were cheated out of the ending that game deserved. All Meals ended up doing was making the most embarrassing call in MLB history and disgracing the game and both teams who busted their asses all night long. I'm not saying Meals cheated, but every Pirate player and fan, as well as baseball fans in general, were cheated. And the Braves will take it, but you know they didn't want to win that way either. Everyone deserved better than the effort Jerry Meals gave at the end of that game.
I have always been a believer that, over the course of 162 games, the bad calls even out. For every time you get screwed, at some point in the season a bad call goes your way. I always felt baseball had a way of working itself out like that. But then this happens, and I have to change my tune a little. This kind of thing can be totally demoralizing to a team, especially a young one. I honestly feel that this singular idiotic call has the magnitude to change the whole season for the Buccos. It depends on how they react. They can let it kill them or they can rally behind it and get that "us against the world" mentality.
So obviously I have to talk about instant replay, which I have always been against with every fiber of my baseball purist being. I have heard a bunch of ideas of how to handle it and most of them are terrible. Obviously they will never replay balls and strikes, and you cant review every close play in a baseball game because they are all close. Giving the coaches the ability to challenge plays like the NFL is a decent idea but I still think it will slow the game down too much. My solution is kind of a mixture of the NHL and NCAA football. First, the umpiring crews are changed from four men to five, one of whom stays up in the replay booth. No one on the field, coach or umpire, decides what will be reviewed. There is enough down-time between plays in baseball for each play to be reviewed by the umpire in the booth, and play is stopped only when he feels a call needs to be overturned. This way the flow of the game is not interrupted unless a call is undoubtedly being changed. This eliminates wasting five minutes at a time for one of those "ruling on the field stands" situations. With the five man crew, the the game is only stopped when the wrong call is made. Baseball is slow and boring enough for most people and stopping play for every bang-bang call would only make it worse. I hate that I had to change my stance on this, but damn Jerry Meals screwed that one up so bad that I have to. Thanks alot you blind bastard.
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