Armando Galarraga has a Perfect Game Stolen From Him
Let me paint you a little picture (and it ain't pretty), the score is 3-0 Tigers against the Indians on the top of the Ninth inning. The crowd of over 17,000 are rocking after an amazing catch that was made by Center-fielder Austin Jackson for the first out. The second out comes on a groundout to short. The next batter grounds the ball between first and second which First baseman Miguel Cabrera fields and throws to Galarraga who is fielding the base and catches the ball while reaches the base before the runner. The call? Safe! Umpire Jim Joyce makes the wrong call on the potential 3rd out of a potential perfect game. Amazing. We had the chance to witness something that has never been seen in over 130 years of the history of MLB: 3 perfect games during one season. There have been two perfectos thrown 5 days apart in 1880 and 2 perfectos as recent as last month (Dallas Braden and Roy Halladay threw one each), let alone 3 (In a future post, I'll expand on a few tidbits I came up with about perfect games).
To Galarraga's credit he was gracious in his on the field interview with the MLB network. The best game of his career was ruined on an obvious play. It wasn't even close enough to be considered "Bang-Bang". Jim Joyce shouldn't even be allowed to umpire in T-Ball. The calls for expanded instant replay will grow louder since all the angles shown prove that the Joyce's call was grossly wrong. We'll see what happens next
Ken Griffey Jr. Announces His Retirement During his 22nd MLB Season
Before I get into this story, it is amazing to me that Ken Griffey Jr., had been playing Baseball in the majors for 21 years. 21 years? It seems like yesterday that I saw him debut with the Seattle Mariners in 1989, play the outfield with his father, hit back to back homers with Griffey Sr and breaking the hearts of Yankees fans at the end Game 5 of the AL Wild Card by sliding in safe with the winning run. This first ballot Hall of Famer has decided to retire today putting an end to an impressive career. In a later post, I'll go into detail about the Hall of Famer career of Ken Grifey Jr. Thanks for the highlights Junior. They were amazing.
FH
Here were Jim Joyce's comments after the game:
ReplyDelete"I just cost that kid a perfect game," Joyce said. "I thought he beat the throw. I was convinced he beat the throw, until I saw the replay."
"It was the biggest call of my career," said Joyce, who became a full-time major league umpire in 1989.
Enough said
Absolutely the best baseball game I have watched!
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