Thu 3 Jun 2010
I’ve been a baseball fan since 1952. Not too coincidentally I’ve also been a Detroit Tigers fan since 1952 — I grew up in a small town in Michigan. The team was awful, but I was ten years old and that didn’t matter to me. Whenever they won, I remember running up to my dad when he came home from work — they played baseball in the daytime then — and telling him, “The Tigers won! The Tigers won!”
I wasn’t very athletic when I was ten. Later on I could play fairly well. But the game of baseball — any sport — has a way of humbling you whenever you think you’re good or even really good. What I discovered, though, back in 1952 were record books. All kinds of numbers for every player on every team and I think I memorized every one of them for the previous year and from then on until Major League Baseball expanded and there were too many teams that were simply too far away and if Detroit didn’t play them, then the numbers started not to mean so much.
There was a fellow on that 1952 team, a team that was in last place all season long, named Virgil Trucks, and even though he had a win-loss record of something like 5 and 22 that season, he pitched two no-hitters. I remember listening to both of them on the radio (no TV back then) but maybe that’s memory speaking, and I only think I listened to them. Maybe one, maybe neither, but I remember listening, and to me that’s all that matters.
Earlier tonight, or really late yesterday, while I was lazing around trying to figure out is rewarded play legit on my phone, I was watching as a pitcher for Detroit named Armando Galarraga was almost a hero, and I think he is, since he pitched a perfect game (not a single opposing batter reaching base for any reason) in which he got 28 outs, one over the legal limit of 27.
He knows he pitched a perfect game, the whole world does — the parts of the world where baseball has any meaning to the people that live there. But in the record books he threw a one-hitter. The very last man he faced in what would have been perfection, 27 batters up, 27 batters down, was called safe by the umpire, a fellow whose life-long career has been umpiring, a fellow nobody ever heard of until now, a fellow named Jim Joyce.
And Jim Joyce missed it. He called the batter safe at first base, but he was out. All of the replays showed it, and Armando Galarraga had to face one more batter. He could have lost control, lost his temper, but he didn’t. He stayed cool, got the next batter out and won the game. In the long run, in baseball terms, that’s the goal. To win the game.
When he saw the replay after the game, Jim Joyce was distraught. He knew he blew it. He apologized profusely, but the game was over. It was too late. It was in the record books.
When that last batter came up, Jim Joyce knew the situation. He’s a baseball fan himself, he has to be. He called the play at first base the way he saw it. He could have taken the easy way out and called the batter out. No one would have blamed him, even if the replay had shown the batter safe. He didn’t shade the truth. He was honest, and he called it the way he saw it. He’s a man of integrity. An honest man.
An honest man who apologized when he discovered he was wrong. A man who probably won’t sleep well again for a long time, but what he did was the job he was paid to do.
When he shows up for work tomorrow, and I hope he can, as he’s in for an ordeal of media coverage that you won’t believe, but whenever he does, the fans in the stadium ought to give him a standing ovation. I know they won’t but if I were there, I’d give him a standing ovation of one person. Me.
June 3rd, 2010 at 1:19 am
Beautifully said, Steve. I was impressed with how both Joyce and Galarraga conducted themselves during and after the game.
June 3rd, 2010 at 5:49 am
I was shocked at how cool Gallaraga stayed after the terrible call, while Jim Leyland (as expected – and for once he was justified) blew his stack as usual. While not as bad as the Denkinger call in the 1985 World Series (possibly the worst call in history) this was pretty bad. I know he honestly believed he was right, but come on! You’re a professional (over 20 years) and you’re paid to get it right. It wasn’t even that close.
That said, I give Joyce all the credit for the way he acted after the game. Even Gallaraga and Leyland were calmed by his apologies.
One more note: I’ve been a Yankee fan since 1956 but my second favorite team in those years was always the Tigers (except for Yankee killer Frank Lary).
June 3rd, 2010 at 7:16 am
I’m with Jeff on this one. It wasn’t even that close. How can a professional, in a situation that important, miss that one?
It’s nice that Joyce apologized, but that doesn’t take away the fact that Gallaraga was robbed of his place in the record books.
By the way, Steve, I remember Virgil (Fire) Trucks and those no-hitters, too. Those were the days.
June 3rd, 2010 at 9:35 am
I love baseball and like Steve I was hooked as a kid in the 1950’s, but with me it was the Whiz Kids, as the Phillies were known because of the 1950 pennant winning team.
I have attended not only the usual major league games but hundreds of minor league games at all levels from low A to triple A. What happened with Jim Joyce has to be one of the worst things I’ve ever seen happen in a baseball game. Even though he is sorry for the blown call, to screw up a perfect game(there have been only 20 in the major leagues), will follow him the rest of his life.
The pitcher was probably smiling because he was stunned and in shock. My own feeling is that in such a situation involving a perfect game the umpire has to be sure he does not impact the game in a negative way. For the 27th and final out he should have been prepared to give the benefit of the doubt to the pitcher. In other words any close call at first base has to be an out. To call the batter safe and then the replay shows that he was out is a real disaster for all concerned. The pitcher is denied his place in the history books and the umpire becomes one of the all time goats.
June 3rd, 2010 at 10:53 am
Too many calls in sports are “situation dependent.” When a no-hitter is going on, or sometimes retroactively in the same game, the official scorer will give the fielder an error when in any other game it would have been a beat-it-out base hit.
It makes everybody feel good, but it’s wrong. The pitcher will accept it, the fans will accept it, the fielder charged with an error will accept it. Even the other team will accept it. It’s one of the “unwritten rules” of baseball, but in the end it cheapens the result.
I certainly don’t know how Jim Joyce saw the play so differently than everybody else, but he didn’t hesitate. He called the batter safe. That’s what he saw, and that’s what he called.
A lot of umpires wouldn’t. They’d take the easy way out. Jim Joyce didn’t.
June 3rd, 2010 at 12:26 pm
I agree with everything that Steve says in comment #5. IF the umpire got the call right. But he got it wrong and this was just not any routine game. It was a game dealing with the last out in a situation that had been done only 20 times before in the entire history of the game. That’s like thousands and thousands of games. In such a situation, with a close call, there was no excuse to screw it up so bad. So bad that there are cries for the commissioner of baseball to step in and declare a perfect game. So bad that the head politician in the state has declared it a perfect game(Which is comical. Maybe the President will step in).
Umpires make incorrect calls all the time and it always blows over. But this was the last out of a perfect game, just about the most unusual and critical time possible. So he calls the guy safe when the replays and everyone else saw the batter out. Calling the batter out on such a close play would not be taking the easy way out, it would be recognizing how important the call was and being sure not to impact the game in a negative way. After all he was definitely out.
I could see us all discussing this play and arguing/agreeing, etc, if the umpire had called him out, but the replay showed he was definitely safe. Then that would be a definite case of “the unwritten rule” or taking the easy way out just to preserve the perfect game.
June 3rd, 2010 at 12:34 pm
While I appreciate that Joyce manfully admitted his mistake and feels terrible about it, I cannot find it in my heart to admire incompetence.
He simply acted manfully, not heroically IMO.
June 3rd, 2010 at 12:55 pm
My father was drafted by the Red Sox and the army on the same day (the army won and he never got the major league career), and when I was old enough to play I still remember what he told me, more or less verbatim.
“Baseball is a game. In the heat of the moment it seems pretty important, and you’ll get caught up in it, but when it’s over, you shake hands with the opposition and the umpires, you pick up your gear, and you go home until the next game.
“It’s all right to get excited about it, it’s all right to yell at the umpire from the stands, and it’s natural to get caught up in it when you’re playing, but even when it breaks your heart it’s still only a game.”
Which was a pretty long speech for my father, but it sounds as if Armando Galarraga and Jim Joyce remembered that even if everyone around them forgot.
Great editorial Steve. Nice to see a little class anywhere — especially in sports.
June 3rd, 2010 at 1:53 pm
Steve is right. I once saw Nolan Ryan (on TV) trying to pitch a no hitter in Anaheim vs. the Yankees and the official scorer gave an Angels fielder an error on a ball that clearly should have been a hit. Fortunately the Yankees did get another ‘legitimate’ hit later in the game, but I wondered how Ryan would have felt if he got a no hitter on such a bogus call.
I’m sure that was far from the only time it’s happened.
June 3rd, 2010 at 2:54 pm
Jim Joyce went back to work today. It couldn’t have been easy. Being the home plate umpire could only have made it harder, but to help defuse any remaining tension, as the game was about to start Detroit manager Jim Leyland sent Armando Galarraga to the plate with the official line-up card. Find the video and watch it.
I don’t know how long this will stay active, but for now, try this one:
http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20100603&content_id=10754280&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb
Just another day at the office? No, not hardly.
There were some boos, of course, but some applause as well. The way each of the participants handled themselves should be an inspiration to everyone.
The commissioner of baseball has ruled that the call stands. A good decision. If he’d gone the other way, think of all of the other bad calls that were acknowledged and never reversed.
Galarraga has been quoted as saying about Jim Joyce, “Nobody’s perfect.”
Well, Galarraga was last night, perfect that is, during the game and after, even if it’s not in record books, and he has a CD of the game to prove it.
And by the way, doesn’t Detroit have a terrific center fielder now?
— Steve
June 4th, 2010 at 11:35 am
Steve, don’t get me started on what Brian Cashman did this past off season. Austin Jackson is another young player the Yankees traded away without giving him a chance. It reminds me of that old episode of STEINFELD when George’s father met Steinbrenner and all he could say was “how could you trade Jay Buhner?” That and signing Nick “I can’t stay on the field two weeks without being injured” Johnson.
June 4th, 2010 at 3:42 pm
Some deals work out, some don’t. Curtis Granderson for Austin Jackson is one that has, so far. You never know. The Tigers recently thought trading for Dontrelle Willis was going to be the solution to some of their pitching problems, but if he ended up winning five games in three years, I’d be surprised. (They finally traded him off the end of this past May.)
In comment #3 Bill Crider said he remembered Virgil (Fire) Trucks, but I wonder how many other people reading this blog do? That’s a long time ago.
When I wrote my original post, I was really upset at all the twitters and twits who wrote them saying that Joyce should be either fired, maimed or worse. I hadn’t thought of Virgil Trucks in years, but when I starting writing, somehow his name came to the surface.
While I was typing away, I didn’t even remember if I’d really listened to either game. But as people started to leave comments here, for which I thank you all very much, whether you agreed with me or not, more and more about Virgil Trucks came back to me.
I still can’t tell you if I listened to that first game, but I researched it some, and Detroit was so bad that year that even though Trucks had a no-hitter through nine innings, it was still 0 to 0 in the bottom of the ninth. With two outs, Vic Wertz hit a home run for Detroit, winning the game 1 to 0.
A month or so later, Trucks pitched a one-hitter. The first batter against him got a single, then he retired the next 27 batters, eking out another 1 to 0 win.
It’s the next game that I do remember. I’d forgotten the details when I wrote this piece that I did, but something happened during that game that obviously has stuck with me all this time.
In the third inning, Phil Rizzuto hit a ball to the shortstop that Johnny Pesky momentarily bobbled, recovered, threw to first, but too late.
It was ruled an error by the official scorer, then a hit. Pressured (I assume) by everyone who knew that the feat of pitching two no-hitters in one season had been done only twice before, the scorer (someone from the NY Times) made a telephone call to Pesky in the dugout, who told him that it was an error all the way.
And the official scorer changed his decision, saving the no-hitter.
Whew! I thought and probably jumped up and down and ran around the house a few times to show everyone how happy I was.
It didn’t occur to me that Johnny Pesky was going to say anything different, whether he bobbled the ball or not.
And yet, while I’d forgotten all of this, I think it stayed me all these years. The achievement was just a little tainted by the process with with the second no-hitter was achieved. Not a lot, just a little, a micrometer’s worth, maybe but the incident was still there in my mind. I hadn’t forgotten it after all.
It’s only a game, but there can’t be a game unless you play by the rules. Some of the rules are unwritten ones, but they’re still rules that are generally followed. (A fellow named ARod seems to run afoul of them more than other players do, for some reason.)
Both teams abide them, even the unwritten ones, and one of the unwritten ones is that the first hit of the game has to be a clean, undisputed one. It’s one of the rules that’s rather elastic and it becomes more and more restrictive as the game goes on.
The problem come when it comes time to apply it, and it sometimes becomes painfully obvious as to what’s going on, as in the Nolan Ryan game that Jeff remembers.
Walker, I agree with you 100% when you say that an umpire should not influence the game in a negative way.
But look at it this way. What’s positive for one team — in this case if Joyce had given Galarraga the perfect game when it wasn’t — is negative for the other. The game was not over. Detroit was ahead by only three runs. Cleveland could have come back and won the game. If the runner had beaten the play, Galarraga might have been so shaken up that he went to pieces and before a reliever could have been brought in, Cleveland might have been ahead by ten runs.
There are a lot of if’s here. A lot of if’s, but bear with me. I know I’m talking hypotheticals, but calling a runner out when he was safe — if that was what had actually happened — would have been easy to do. No one would have complained, not even Cleveland. The hitter for Cleveland assumed he’d be out on a close play, what with the unwritten rule, the magnitude of the situation and everything that was riding on the one call.
Unfortunately for Jim Joyce, he called it correctly and as honestly as he could — as he saw it — and this is why I consider him a hero.
But how he saw it so badly wrong, it is difficult to fathom.
Without a doubt it was a Colossal Blunder on Jim Joyce’s part, there’s no way of denying that, and to his credit, he didn’t either, and he said so immediately, when he found out how wrong he was.
It was a close play, there were a lot of things to be watching all at the same time, but there’s really no defense for Joyce and the fact that he blew the call.
But once again, the game was not over. If he had been right, that the runner was safe, Cleveland could have won the game. He saw what he saw, and he called it the way he saw it. He broke the unwritten rule that the first hit has to be a clean one, and if he should be castigated for anything, that’s what he did wrong.
I was only ten years old when I listened to the game in which Virgil Trucks pitched that second no-hitter, but though in one sense I’d forgotten it, I think the game has stayed with me ever since.
There are no do-overs in baseball. The game is what it is. There’s no going back. Everyone knows what happened, whether it occurred in 1952 or if it was only a couple of nights ago.
I think Bud Selig was right in not changing the result, but in all honesty, I think he could have, he has the power to do so, and I wouldn’t have called him wrong if he had.
Instant replay, if the rules for doing so can be set up so it can be done easily and efficiently? Absolutely. I think so. But strangely enough, not even all of the players agree on that.
It’s the human factor that’s important some say. Yes, perhaps, but neither is there anything wrong in getting it right, is there?
— Steve