However over the past week while watching October Baseball's Divisions Series on TBS the "tenth man" took a different form. While fans screamed, jumped, and waved their rally towels they were certainly not the ones making the difference in some big games, their thunder was stolen by the men in black; the umpires. While teams gritted it out in games 163, 4 and 5, you would think the umps would simply go about their business as usual and merely be mediators on the field of battle. If so, you thought wrong. In two key spots during the Division Series' umpires made calls that became fatal to teams, and in the long run could be fatal to the purity of the game.
With the game tied in the 11th inning in Game 2 of the ALCS Series between the Yankees and Twins, AL batting champion Joe Mauer stepped up to the plate to simply do some damage. He proceeded to line a ball down the left field line that hopped up into the stands for a ground rule double, or so he thought. With the ball bouncing a few feet into fair territory Mauer was slowing rounding first with his rare free pass to second when the LEFT FIELD umpire Phil Cuzzi raised both his arms into the air indicating that the ball had fallen foul. There are times when umps can be excused for making bad calls, this situation was however not one of them. Let us recall that a little while back baseball insisted on paying six umpires instead of four to make sure that they had people not only on top of what was going on in the infield, but the outfield as well. Well Phil Cuzzi you are a waste of a sixth umpire, and maybe with five umps on the field the third base umpire could have made a better call. Mauer would single later in the at bat. The two men who followed him would single as well, but the Twins would leave the bases loaded, and would lose on a Mark Texiera walk-off in the next inning. Had Mauer had been on second to start the inning, he would have scored on one of the singles, and changed that game and the series completely.
Similar story in Colorado. With the Game tied at 5 in the top of the ninth Chase Utley stared down Huston Street with the go ahead run in the form of Jimmy Rollins standing at second base with one out. He proceeded to lazily stick his bat out in front of the plate and squeeze a chopper down the first baseline. When Utley went to run it out, the ball made contact with his side while he was still in the batter's box. Utley being the heads up player that he is ran the play out and found himself standing safe on first with a smirk on his face. Ryan Howard followed with a sacrifice fly that would put the Phillies ahead and would later win the game. Replay showed that Utley's ball struck him while he was still in the box, and should've have been called a foul ball, which would have meant Rollins would have never been on third base for Ryan Howard. Just like the case in New York, the outcome of the game was altered by an umpire and the outcome of the series as well.
The point here, is that baseball, America's Pastime, is slowly going to lose its purty. Baseball is one of the few sports left that is called solely by the man's naked eye, it is one of the few sports left that has final results that are not artificially made; because it is simply, pure. But when does purity relinquish its grip on baseball to make way for justice? When will instant replay in baseball stretch farther than just disputed home runs? If steroids bringing about fake home runs and fake heroes wasn't bad enough, fans will soon be robbed of their man made results soon as well, because the sixth umpire on the field forgot to put his contacts in before the game. The day where baseball starts to use instant replay to decide close calls is a day that will be sad, and frankly, is coming soon.
JD
