Buddy Boy Blew it!

I am a baseball fan, big time. This will surprise no one. As such I have an opinion about the recent perfect game / not perfect game that occurred in Detroit on June 2nd. This should surprise no one. I’m going to tell you my opinion on this. Hey, I do a podcast and write a blog, of course I have an opinion and I’m going to share it.

First, Jim Joyce, umpire and supposed evil doer. He is a person and he made a mistake. Mistakes do happen, lots of umpires make them but when they make one on a national stage like in a playoff game or World Series or when both ESPN and MLB TV have joined in coverage of a game live, then the magnitude is intensified, the hot lights of fame and history begin to scorch. Look, he made a mistake; he checked the replay, realized his error and then apologized profusely, expressed sorrow at the bad call and actually was genuinely emotional the next day when he returned to the place of his mistake. He did everything right except make a good call but his grace and aplomb under the intense pressure and scrutiny is exemplary.

Armando Galarraga has been a fringe major league pitcher who was on the doorstep of immortality in baseball terms. Perfect games are rare and his performance during the game, after the mistake was made and following the game in interviews and actions, was unbelievably strong, a lesson for us all. In my mind, he may now be even more famous as the pitcher who was robbed of his perfect chance yet he should be known and held up on a pedestal as an example to us all of grace under pressure, showing compassion and understanding and maintaining his dignity when many others lose theirs. Contrast his smile and getting back to work in the game to George Brett’s dugout explosion so many years ago and tell me which is the better role model for our kids AND us.

Finally Bud Selig, Baseball commissioner. Well, he blew it. He blew it big time. He had a chance to hit a grand slam in this situation and instead bunted into a double play. Instead of showing that the human element is important to baseball and correcting a bad mistake, he allows it so stand, for the umpire to take the heat, for the player to lose his moment in the sun because of a presedent he was afraid to set, yet has already been set many times before. Brett’s none home run to home run, Haddux’s perfect game to not perfect game, trades rescinded for the good of baseball, drug suspensions, all examples of baseball stepping in and fixing errors. Look, the player was out at first base. The umpire admitted such, the Tigers admitted such, the batter himself admitted such yet Buddy Boy failed to act, instead saying that this will cause him to look at the use of instant replay further. And here in lies the double play. Bad enough he popped up the bunt but he compounds it by talking about the human element in baseball and mistakes, and then offers to review the call for more TV cameras, video tape machines, computers, maybe an eye in the sky to correct mistakes from happening in the future. It could have been simple. Selig could have just said “Baseball is a great game played by and umpired by people. Occasionally a mistake is made of such proportion that we need to intervene. Jim Joyce admitted he was in error and so I am going to do the most human of all things possible in our game. We are going to forgive this mistake. I am going to rule that Mr. Galarraga effort be judged to be a perfect game, a masterpiece of excellence and as such Baseball will hold both Mr. Galarraga and Mr. Joyce up as examples of grace and humanity to us all in this emotional time.”

Simple. human forgiving. A lesson for us all. Taught by Armando Galarraga, missed by Bud Selig.