UNFUCKING BELIEVABLE: FIRE THAT UMPIRE!

[grizzaholic]

If I was your boss and you worked your ass off every day and turned in exeptional work each and every day for 20 years and then one day you handed me some sub-par crap I should suspend you, fine you, and give you a few days off to think about your actions, whether it was an honest mistake on your part or not? All the while not counting any of your past work into the situation?

Here's a more fitting analogy. Let's say that about twenty times every 130 years in my company a major project comes along. My boss gives me the responsibility for this project and I botch it. I think it would be fitting that my boss not give me another project of that magnitude again until I can regain the trust that I am capable of handling it.

That's all I'm saying. Guys get old, their reflexes slow, and their judgement gets worse. It happens to all of us. Being "classy" about your screwup doesn't make you any less responsible for your actions than the old driver who plows over a cyclist. The penalty for the ladder should be jail. The penalty for the former should be being withheld from working high profile games for a probationary period, IMHO.

We won't agree so I will step away.

[clenz]

If I was your boss and you worked your ass off every day and turned in exeptional work each and every day for 20 years and then one day you handed me some sub-par crap I should suspend you, fine you, and give you a few days off to think about your actions, whether it was an honest mistake on your part or not? All the while not counting any of your past work into the situation?

Here's a more fitting analogy. Let's say that about twenty times every 130 years in my company a major project comes along. My boss gives me the responsibility for this project and I botch it. I think it would be fitting that my boss not give me another project of that magnitude again until I can regain the trust that I am capable of handling it.

That's all I'm saying. Guys get old, their reflexes slow, and their judgement gets worse. It happens to all of us. Being "classy" about your screwup doesn't make you any less responsible for your actions than the old driver who plows over a cyclist. The penalty for the ladder should be jail. The penalty for the former should be being withheld from working high profile games for a probationary period, IMHO.

One call and he gets probation out of the hundreds of calls that are made every day? Your fucking kidding right?

Should a home plate ump get suspended every time he misses a ball/strike call?


You keep acting like this is the first time that an ump has missed a call on the bases, it isn't.


Joyce is one of the best in the game. He can't be one of the best for his entire career, but one call all of a sudden and he is the worst ump ever and should lose his job.


BTW your analogy sucks. His job wasn't to insure that the perfect game wasn't botched, he isn't in charge of something that happens 20 times in 130 years. He made probably 30 calls that game before that play.

[93henfan]

Lol @ Clenz. He umps a couple of little league games and now he's an expert.

Joyce badly botched a call in one of the more significant moments in MLB history. It's a helluva lot more significant than your run of the mill blown call, and comes on the heel of some really bad umpiring all year MLB-wide. At some point, you have to send a message.

Btw, I agree with Col Hogan's take in one of the threads going on that balls and strikes should not be replayable. But something like this that was so obvious, there just has to be a system in place to make the screwup right.

[dgreco]

Selig wont reverse outcome.

[93henfan]

Selig wont reverse outcome.

As expected. Par.

Too bad this didn't happen a few years earlier so we could just throw it away with the rest of the steroid era that Selig perpetuated. What a stain this guy has been to the game.

[89Hen]

Joyce was behing the plate for today's game...

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/Jim- ... ?GT1=39002

Joyce was behind the plate for Thursday afternoon’s game between the Tigers and Indians, wiping away tears and needing an extra moment to compose himself before entering the field via the tunnel behind home plate at 1 p.m. ET.

Fans close to the tunnel applauded as the umpire crew took the field. The cheers continued as Galarraga, bearing the lineup card, shook hands with Joyce.

[Rob Iola]

It's easy for us fuckers to sit here, see the replay hundreds of times on TV and saw he made the wrong call. How many of you fuckers have ever umped a game? I'm not talking little league, t-ball, or even fucking middle school. I'm talking baseball at a high level (high school and up). If you have umped those games, you've missed at least one call. Hell, I can go back to a game last year where I probably missed 2 or 3 calls at first base due to the speed of the runner and the throw. I don't know for sure, and thankfully I don't have the nation calling for me to be fired form the state association, defaming my name on the internet, sending me death threats, etc... all over a fucking game.


Yes, I realize it would have been historic but you all need to realize IT'S A GOD DAMMED GAME. No one is going to be any smarter, dumber, faster, slower, have a better job, worse job, hotter significant other, etc... because of the call. Had this call happened in the first inning it wouldn't be an issue. Had this call happened and their had been a hit earlier in the game it isn't even talked about.


Unless you have been in the situation to make calls on bang bang plays like that and you have NEVER missed one sit down and shut the fuck up.


Oh, and Joyce is probably top 5 in terms of the best umps in baseball.


I do think, and have thought for a long time, that with the technology that we have that instant replay needs to be implements for bang bang plays on base, whether or not the guy pulled his foot, home runs, fair/foul, but NEVER for balls and strikes.

Whoa there champ - maybe a nice glass of red wine would calm those jangled nerves...

I've been there - IMHO field umping is tougher than doing the plate, especially bangers at 2nd. I got into umping because I was a typical blowhard dad who decided to learn how to do it because I did in fact think I could do a better job than the umps out there (and I was right, at least in terms of disposition - I really hate fellow umps who have an attitude out there). I know the rules and mechanics and have enough experience to know how to "manage" the game and game situations. But I'm no MLB-caliber ump and certainly no Jim Joyce.

But here's the thing - it wasn't even a banger - it wasn't close - his eyes told him 1 thing but his brain told him that the runner beat the throw (per his own comments). I've had the exact same thing happen to me out on the field. It's inexplicable but it happens. And there's no reason to get defensive about it - everyone should be hollering, and then you apologize, they acknowledge your human failings, and everyone moves on. This seems to be happening here, and thankfully it appears that people are judging Joyce on his overall competency and not just on 1 mistake.