Umps blow another call; complete morons now the only ones in opposition to MLB instant replay

In Sunday night’s subway series blowout, Carlos Delgado sliced a shot off of the left field fair pole for what should have been a home run. The correct call was initially made by the umpire with the best angle to make such a call, but was then overturned after a quick umpire pow-wow. The net result was a wrong call that directly took runs off the board for the suddenly potent New York Metropolitans. While the Mets went on to lay a severe beating on the Yankees (woo-hoo) rendering the missed call harmless (though Carlos Delgado owners in head-to-head fantasy leagues may beg to differ), what happens when the same call is missed in a one-run playoff game? Or in game 7 of the World Series?

Much like the college football playoff debate, there are really no legitimate reasons to avoid using instant replay in Major League Baseball in this one particular situation. It’s argued that it will slow down the game. These games already last three hours, the extra thirty seconds it will take to make a call up to a replay official won’t materially affect the length of the game. If you are really worried about the game slowing down, maybe do something to prevent hitters from backing out of the box and doing a five minute routine which includes loosening, then tightening, their batting gloves, taking off, then replacing, their helmet, spitting into their gloves, rubbing them into the dirt, spitting into them again, pulling up their pant legs, saying a prayer, doing the electric slide, and whistling the theme from Mission: Impossible in between every pitch. Or maybe put a pitch clock on the pitcher so guys like Dice-K don’t take so much time between pitches that I can watch the first pitch and then cycle through every channel on digital cable to see what else is on before turning it back and seeing the second pitch of the at-bat. I’m a Red Sox fan but I don’t know that I could go see a game Dice-K starts - it’s like a six hour commitment. I’ve had relationships that haven’t lasted that long.

Another widely used (and flimsy) argument mostly used by purists is that replay would take away from the human element of the game. Yeah, it takes away some of the human ERROR in judgment. Humans are still playing the game and for the most part humans are still making the calls. If MLB were worried about the “human element” of baseball being taken away then they should have outlawed Barry Bonds’ bionic arm in the latter part of his career (not to mention his tyrannosaurus head – now that is inhuman). The only reason this “human element” argument is given any credence at all is because baseball happened to be invented in the mid 1800s when there was no alternative. If baseball were invented in the 1970s we’d most likely have replay on fair/fowl calls, and probably on safe/out at home plate. (We’d also probably have half the league sporting uniforms comparable to the old Astro’s unis. Now that would be sweet.) True or false: The MLB rulebook says that if a ball hits the foul pole it is a home run? That would be true. It does not say, “If a ball hits the foul pole it is a home run if and only if a human being standing on the field sees it hit the foul pole.” Trust me, way back in 1845 when Alexander Cartwright formalized a list of rules to be followed by all baseball clubs, if they had the technology to produce instant replay, they would have used it to determine whether balls that went into the stands near the foul pole were fair or foul. You don’t see professional bowlers retrieving their own balls because the automatic ball return takes away from the human element of bowling. Nor do you see society shunning the telephone and internet because it takes away from the human element of running to the next village to pass along news.

The last argument heard most often against instant replay for fair/foul calls in baseball is the slippery slope argument. It goes something like this: “if we allow instant replay for that, then we open the door for replay being used to review everything right down to balls and strikes. Where does it stop?” This is the biggest horse shit argument of them all. You know where it stops? Right at fair/foul calls. Write it into the rule. That’s it. The NFL has calls that are not reviewable by instant replay, why is it impossible for MLB to do the same? The slippery slope argument is what people use when they don’t want something to happen, but they can’t come up with a legitimate reason to stop it. It’s like saying, “we shouldn’t allow people to drink alcohol because what’s next, allowing them to drink alcohol and then drive, and then eventually people drinking as much alcohol as they want and then drive while continuing to consume alcohol?” Well I will not sit here idly and allow you to take away my happine… I mean alcohol.

This slippery slope argument for replay is as ridiculous as saying, “If we allow the players to wear anything they want under their uniforms it opens the door for them to wear women’s underwear and then eventually thongs.” Alright, maybe that was a bad example.

What the hell is wrong with Giambi anyway? Back when I played ball I went through some slumps, but the following thought never crossed my mind: “I just can’t seem to find my swing right now. You know what might help? Wearing a thong. Yes of course! And it must be a gold one. I can’t see a better way of turning my luck around than wearing underwear that is guaranteed to ride up my ass the entire time I’m wearing it. Those guys that change their pre at-bat routine or wear a different undershirt are suckers. The real key to beating a slump is letting your cheeks breathe. This gold thong thing is can’t-miss.” Here’s an idea to turn around your luck, Jason. How about when the opposition puts their entire team on the right side of the field you send a ball the opposite way for a guaranteed hit instead of stubbornly trying to pull every pitch over the right field wall even though your steroid muscles disappeared a couple years ago.