NY Times writer calls blown call “courageous”

Jeremy Hawn — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 15:12:18 +0000

After last night’s blown call with 2 outs in the bottom of the 9th of a perfect game by Armando Galarraga, umpire Jim Joyce ruined an extremely rare event in baseball history. There had never been 3 perfect games in one season, let alone in one month, and now that is still the case because of one umpire’s bad call. But I’m not writing to eviscerate Jim Joyce. He made a bad call. A REALLY bad call (it wasn’t even close), but still. And he made it in a sport that doesn’t allow replay on anything that home runs. Yet, because the replay technology exists, he was able to look at that same footage minutes later, footage that could have saved this piece of history from being ruined, and admit that he got it wrong. That said, we obviously need to expand replay to include calls at the bases, and to fair and foul balls that aren’t home runs. Was he safe our was he out? Was it fair or foul? These are things that are easy to determine if you review the footage, and we need to get the calls right.

Tyler Kepner thinks fucking up is courageous. I think that's his way of making himself feel better about his own life.

So now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, it’s time to channel my inner “Fire Joe Morgan.”

Here is a quote from this morning’s NY TImes story on the blown perfect game by writer Tyler Kepner:

“The courageous call is the one Joyce made. It was so obviously wrong that Joyce, a major league umpire since 1989, clearly had no desire to help Galarraga make history. He simply called the play as he saw it. The problem, of course, is that Joyce’s decision is easily the most egregious blown call in baseball over the last 25 years.”

Wow. Let me start off my retort by addressing Tyler Kepner. Mr. Kepner, you just wrote the dumbest thing I’ve ever read about sports. Seriously. Making a blown call is courageous? Are you sure you weren’t looking for “egregious” or “outrageous?” No, you clearly really did mean that someone fucking something up is an act of courage. The fact that it was wrong was an afterthought to you? The most important thing, to you, was that this guy had conviction while shitting on a piece of history. If it was a close call, and Joyce had gotten it right, he should have been lauded for not bending the rules to cheapen such an achievement. But the call wasn’t even close. He was out by a whole step. I feel bad for Joyce now that he admitted his huge mistake, but that doesn’t make him a fucking hero for standing up for what was obviously wrong, not just in hindsight, but at the time. He’s not a martyr. He’s not a hero. He didn’t display valor while committing the job performance equivalent of shitting his pants in public. He’s a fuck up. And so are you. Tyler Kepner showed courage in defending the indefensible. If you would like to express your disgust with Mr. Keppinger, you can find him on street corners arguing with complete strangers in defense of OJ’s not guilty verdict, the Iraq war invasion and WMD claims, and BP saving money on safety measures at their oil wells.

The Other Fifteen » Armando Galarraga

NY Times writer calls blown call “courageous”