Beauty in Imperfection

This season in Major League Baseball is fast becoming the year of the pitcher. With steroids out of the game, the strong young arms of the league are going to the rubber with a new found confidence and willingness to challenge hitters without feeling like every strike they throw could end up in the seats. The season has already seen two perfect games and another no-hitter; the league leaders in home runs are currently on pace to come up short of 50 dingers, and hurlers like Ubaldo Jimenez, Roy Halladay, Jaime Garcia, Josh Johnson, and David Price are putting up ridiculous numbers to this point in the season. Most experts around the league don't feel like this is a flash in the pan trend either. The league is seeing a large influx of young pitching talent to keep the league low scoring for probably the next decade and beyond. In the midst of this renaissance of pitching, another transcendent pitching performance was put on by third-year Tigers' starting pitcher Armando Galarraga. By now, I'm sure most of the world has now seen the infamous play in which Galarraga clearly beats Cleveland infielder Jason Donald to first base with two outs in the 9th inning of what should have been a perfect game only to see umpire Jim Joyce signal that Donald was safe on the play. In one moment, the entire city of Detroit let out a collective gasp, as did most of the country. The story has been the cause of great debate through all the sports talk shows. Should baseball use more instant replay? Should Joyce be punished? Should commissioner Bud Selig reverse the call? But all these debates take away from the beauty of what has happened since the mistaken call.
The most incredible part of the story is the aftermath in the Tigers' clubhouse and in the city of Detroit. It began almost immediately in the post game interviews of Tigers skipper Jim Leyland and Galarraga. Leyland, despite going after Joyce immediately after the play and after the 28th and final out, had nothing but positive things to say about Joyce in his postgame comments. He called Joyce a class act and pointed out that people make mistakes and that the human element is a part of baseball. He also accurately mentioned that no one would feel worse about the blown call than Joyce himself once he saw the replay. Galarraga had similar things to say, pointing out that these things happen and he still considered it a perfect game regardless of what the record books would say. As for Jim Joyce, he was as upset as anyone over the result of the game. He stated that he took a perfect game away from that kid, and that he blew the call and that it was the "biggest call of his career." Joyce as an umpire knows all too well of how one call can change how an umpire is remembered. Umpire Tim McClelland is still remembered as the umpire who negated a George Brett go-ahead home run against the Yankees in the ninth inning of a game in 1983. That call was later reversed by the MLB, which keeps that from being solely how McClelland is remembered. Don Denkinger was not so lucky. Umpiring in the 1985 world series between the Cardinals and the Royals, Denkinger blew a call on a play at first with the pitcher covering in which he ruled that the Royals' Jorge Orta beat Cardinal pitcher Todd Worrell to the bag when it was clear in replay he was out by a half a step. Cardinal fans believe the call cost them the '85 series and I'm sure many of them would not welcome Denkinger back to St. Louis even today. Jim Joyce blew a similar call in Wednesday's game, but the World Series title was not at stake. There have been over 100 World Series titles won in the history of baseball, but only 20 perfect games. Joyce could have wound up a bigger goat than Denkinger, Bill Buckner, and even Steve Bartman, but that's not how the Tigers and their city felt.
Joyce was again at Comerica Park on Thursday to call the finale of the Tigers-Indians series, unsure of how he would be received. It didn't take long for him to find out. Armando Galarraga brought out the Tigers' lineup card for the game and he and Joyce met at the plate and shook hands as men and exchanged a few understanding words to each other, and the stadium wildly applauded. There was no ill will towards the man who had cost the Tigers' youngster a spot in history from anyone in Comerica Park. Jim Joyce admittedly got a little misty eyed at the reception from the crowd. In a sports world where people so often remember the worst of someone's career, this one moment, the day after one of the most memorable blown calls in baseball history, the Detroit Tigers and their fans showed us the best of the sport. Everyone involved handled the situation with class and dignity, and that is almost as impressive as what Galarraga did on the mound on Wednesday. He did, after all, retire 28 hitters in a row.

Welcome to Foss's Sports Corner

This is my first ever blog, so bear with me for this one. My name is Shawn Foss and for as long as I can remember I have been a diehard sports fan. My friends all come to me for trivia answers and I love to debate and talk about sports with anyone who has an opinion and knows what they're talking about at least to a degree. So, with that in mind I decided hey, what better outlet for me to connect with people about the wide world of sports and put my opinions out there and get feedback than through my own sports blog. And so, Each week or so I intend to write a new entry on whatever is on my mind in the world of sports. More often than not, my entries will be about baseball or football, but they won't be limited to that. Hopefully, my blog posts will keep people coming back to read more, and maybe I can fire up some good old fashioned debate's about my favorite subject. That's all I have to say for an introduction, but I promise the rest of my posts will have some more interesting sports info and opinions. Enjoy