Brandon Phillips, Don't Showboat, Miguel Batista

Phillips Preens, Nats Respond

Posted on by Jason Turbow

The Code was at work Saturday in Washington—and it worked perfectly.

There was Cincinnati’s Brandon Phillips, pounding his chest in the eighth inning after dislodging the ball from Nationals catcher Wil Nieves on a play at the plate, the run he scored extending his team’s lead to 5-1.

There was Washington reliever Miguel Batista the following inning, placing a 93 mph fastball into Phillips’ ribs.

There was Phillips, failing even to flinch before jogging to first base without so much as acknowledging what had just happened. (Watch it here.)

Situation ignited, situation handled, situation resolved.

While telling reporters after the game that he plays with excitement, and that he didn’t see anything wrong with his actions, Phillips made sure to add that “if people think I did something wrong, I apologize to whoever thinks so. . . . They did their job and I did mine. Lesson learned.”

In the other clubhouse, Batista—who was ejected by umpire Joe West after hitting Phillips—held up his end of the bargain by denying all intent.

“No, just playing baseball,” he said in the Washington Post, when asked if he had meant to hit Phillips. “Everybody knows Phillips, you got to go way in and way out . . . and that one got away. I mean, he knows he did wrong. He got booed by the fans, so we’re here to win. We’re not here to be fine with everybody who do wrong against us. . . . If it looks suspicious, (West) has the right to throw me out, but he was the only one that thought it was intentional. ”

Batista would have benefitted from coordinating stories with his catcher.

“I think everybody in the ballpark kind of knew that that was going to happen,” Nieves told the Post. “So he got hit, and I thought he got hit where he was supposed to. Not in the head. Obviously, we don’t play like that. Miguel hit him in a good spot.”

“I’m pretty sure he knew he did it wrong,” he added. “Hopefully. And hopefully he won’t do it again.”

– Jason

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This Week in the Unwritten Rules

This Week in the Unwritten Rules

Posted on by Jason Turbow

A week shortened by Memorial Day gives us a truncated list of Code violations.

June 1
Nearly everybody respected the Code during Roy Halladay’s perfect game (and those that didn’t still couldn’t jinx it).

June 2
Carlos Gomez put on a whale of a show while pimping his homer. His saving grace: contrition after the fact.

June 3
Jim Joyce blows a perfect game for Armando Galarraga. Had he hewn to the Code, he never would have made that mistake.

June 4
For those who thought Joyce set the umpiring profession back a generation, a Triple-A call-up showed them how it’s really done.

– Jason

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Jason Kendall, Mike Estabrook, Umpire Relations

A Bad Week for Umpires Gets Even Worse

Posted on by Jason Turbow

Jim Joyce was responsible for a horrific call, but one call does not a bad umpire make.

Mike Estabrook shouldn’t get off that easy.

Estabrook, the umpire behind the plate for the Royals-Angels game yesterday, didn’t react well when Kansas City catcher Jason Kendall questioned his strike zone.

For catchers, the unwritten rule when it comes to dealing with umpires is to avoid showing them up, to which Kendall adhered. After Estabrook called a ball on a good-looking Zack Greinke pitch, the catcher questioned the decision without turning around or indicating in any way that he was even addressing the umpire.

Sometimes when umpires feel the need to go eye-to-eye with a catcher, they’ll walk to the pitcher’s side of the plate and bend over to dust it off, in the process saying whatever it is they feel need be said.

Estabrook, however, moved into the left-handed batter’s box, and, hands on knees, bent down to get into the squatting Kendall’s face, as if he was chewing out a four-year-old. (Watch it here.)

Estabrook is a call-up ump from Triple-A. Kendall, without hyperbole, probably knows more about playing catcher than any of his big-league contemporaries.

It was a disgraceful display.

Royals manager Ned Yost came out to question just what the hell it was Estabrook thought he was doing, and promptly got tossed. (“I’ll never let an umpire show up one of my players, and that’s exactly what he was doing,” he said after the game.)

While it’s valid to question whether Kendall said something to elicit that sort of response, there are several factors to consider:

  • Kendall knows exactly what and what not to say to an umpire when questioning a call.
  • If Kendall did say something to piss of Estabrook that badly, he should have been ejected on the spot, rather than shown up.
  • Kendall followed the Code so closely when addressing Estabrook that even as the umpire continued to talk to him after tossing Yost, Kendall would not turn around to face him.

“He missed a pitch, and I was talking to him about it, and he came out in front, which I’ve never really seen,” Kendall said after the game. “I told him he’d better get out of my face. It was unprofessional what he did.”

Unprofessional is one way to put it. Disrespectful is another. One can only hope that Estabrook picks up the finer points of the Code before his next stint in the major leagues.

– Jason

7
Articles

Weighing in on Replay in the Times

Posted on by Jason Turbow

In the wake of Perfect Game-gate this morning, the New York Times asked me to weigh in on the notion of baseball implementing a comprehensive replay system. Turns out they placed me in some pretty select company; also contributing were Keith Olbermann, longtime Times writer Gerald Eskenazi and Will Carroll, from Baseball Prospectus. Read the story here.

Needless to say, nobody took a stand against replay (although Eskenazi was non-committal). Now it just waits to be seen whether umpire Jim Joyce makes Olbermann’s Worst Person in the World list.

– Jason

0
Armando Galarraga, Jim Joyce, The First Hit of a Game Must be Clean

Blown Call Illustrates What to Do When Staring Down the Barrel of Perfection

Posted on by Jason Turbow

Most of the chatter about last night’s blown call that cost Detroit’s Armando Galarraga a perfect game has to do with whether Major League Baseball might overturn it, and the chances of the league implementing a more comprehensive replay policy.

More immediate, however, is the unwritten rulebook, one section of which calls for official scorers to mandate that the first hit of any game must be unequivocally clean. It’s designed to prevent second-guessing, should that hit—or error, depending on one’s perspective—end up being the only one the pitcher gives up on the night.

Last night brought the rule to field level. As umpire Jim Joyce has no doubt learned, any hit over the final inning(s) of a no-hitter should be beyond reproach. The moment that Joyce called Cleveland’s Jason Donald safe on a play that beat him by a full step, he was informed of this—first by Tigers manager Jim Leyland, then by a TV replay in his dressing room, and ever since by a legion of angry baseball bloggers. (Watch the play here.)

For the clearest perspective on the rule, turn to Donald himself.

“It was so bang-bang that I thought for sure I’d get called out because of everything at stake,” he told the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

Donald is all of 15 games into his big-league career, and knows things that Joyce, a 21-year veteran, had yet to learn.

Perspective can do wonders for a person, however. After watching the replay, Joyce tearfully apologized to Gallaraga and the Tigers, both in person and through the press. One of his takeaways from the experience clarified the parameters under which the Code takes precedence.

“This wasn’t a call,” he said in the Detroit News. “This was a history call. And I kicked the shit out of it.”

It’s not the first time this has happened to would-be perfection. As pointed out by ESPN.com, Milt Pappas was 26 outs into his own perfect game in 1972, when plate umpire Bruce Froemming ruled that a full-count pitch—close enough to argue—was a ball.

The Code mandates that any pitcher on the cusp of greatness has earned the benefit of any doubt that may exist. That concept could be seen in action yesterday, but not in Detroit—in Newport News, VA, in a collegiate summer league game.

There, pitcher Jharel Cotton of the Peninsula Pilots didn’t give up a hit until two were out in the eighth inning. At that point, a batter broke it up by beating out a bunt, as the third baseman’s hurried throw was off the mark. (We’ll forgive the indiscretion of bunting to break up a no-hitter; it was a 10-0 game, but college kids can’t be expected to know all the rules of their big-league brethren.)

Afterward, the Pilots convinced the league office to overturn the call, ruling it an error and preserving the no-no.

If only it was that easy for Jim Joyce.

– Jason

5
Carlos Gomez, Don't Showboat

Gomez Flips, Trips, Quips – and Ultimately Slips out of Trouble

Posted on by Jason Turbow

As has long been trumpeted in this space, the unwritten rules are less about on-field actions than the meaning behind those actions. It’s why something as innocuous as a stolen base can serve to enrage an entire roster should it occur at an inopportune moment.

The inverse is also true. Should a ballplayer do something that by most indicators is viewed as disrespectful, he can get away with it if the opposition understands where he’s coming from.

So it went last week with Milwaukee’s Carlos Gomez, who actually hit a trifecta of sorts in a game against the Twins.

He hit a monster home run, then admired it.

Then he flipped his bat—which clipped Minnesota catcher Joe Mauer’s wrist on the way down—and threw up his hands in victory.

Mauer waited for Gomez to circle the bases, then mentioned to him that he might want to be more careful in the future. Gomez—without even bothering to turn around, threw up his arms and, back to his opponent, gave Mauer wiggly fingered jazz hands, indicating that he wanted no part of whatever it was the catcher was trying to convey. (Watch it here.)

All of this for a home run that came while his team was trailing, 15-0.

None of this was even remotely okay. Gomez, however, had some things working in his favor.

Most immediately was the fact that he spent the previous two seasons in Minnesota, which gave the Twins a long taste of his exuberance in such situations. He even paid a visit to the opposing clubhouse before the game, to greet manager Ron Gardenhire and his former teammates.

Because they’d seen his act before, they knew it was not personal. (They also knew that he’d just come off the disabled list, and was especially excited to forge a strong start.)

“Just one of those moments that we know Go-Go can have every once in a while,” said Gardenhire in the Associated Press report. “He was excited, and it just happened.”

“We played with him the last couple years, that’s the type of player he is,” Twins starter Nick Blackburn told MLB.com. “It made me mad, but I shouldn’t be getting mad at stuff like that. I’m sure everyone on his team also knew he shouldn’t have done it, but that’s the type of guy he is. He gets so caught up in the moment.”

Even more importantly, Gomez recognized what he did, nearly as soon as he did it. Upon returning to the dugout, he was informed by teammate Joe Inglett that Mauer was offering words of caution, not talking smack.

Gomez regretted his actions immediately. After the game he offered blanket apologies for his actions.

“I didn’t even know the bat was going to hit him,” he said. “I’ll say again: I didn’t try to do this. . . . I had a good night, but you have to be more professional.”

MLB.com quoted him as saying, “Right now, I feel bad because Blackburn is one of the good friends I’ve got over there. I apologized because I don’t want to try to show him up.”

Gomez also addressed the notion of getting drilled the following day, adding, “I’m going to take it like a man because I know I did [something] bad.”

That might have been enough to get him off the hook; he wasn’t hit by a pitch for the remainder of the series.

– Jason

0
No-Hitter Etiquette, Roy Halladay

Nearly Perfect Perfect-Game Decorum During Halladay’s Gem

Posted on by Jason Turbow

Roy Halladay’s perfect game on Saturday was a study in execution. Pitching dominance is one thing, but the performance also served to illustrate any number of lessons having to do with no-hitter decorum.

Don’t talk to the pitcher

The Code says to never address a pitcher as he’s throwing a no-hitter. Because Halladay generally doesn’t talk to teammates through the course of any of his starts, this wasn’t difficult to pull off. When asked the point at which his teammates started avoiding him, he said, “2:30, 3 o’clock this afternoon.”

Change nothing
Routines are important in baseball. According to superstition, should somebody change something—anything—they could well find themselves serving up an unintentional jinx.

According to tradition, various members of the Phillies kept up with whatever they’d been doing:

  • General manager Ruben Amaro Jr. had planned to spend only two innings watching the game from the stands, but as Halladay piled up out after out, he opted not to move.
  • In the bullpen, relievers went through their usual routines for preparing to enter the game, even though it was clear that none of them would be needed.
  • Philadelphia’s reserve players didn’t move from their spots on the bench after the sixth inning; pitching coach Rich Dubee didn’t uncross his legs for the final three frames.
  • In the broadcast booth, TV play-by-play man Tom McCarthy refrained from getting up for his usual seventh-inning break. (Although he did discuss the perfect game on the air. So much for that jinx.)

Respect greatness
The Phillies’ bench wasn’t the only location in the ballpark for perfect- game decorum. In its review of the game, Baseball Daily Digest reported that Marlins outfielder Chris Coghlan—already upset by several outside pitches that had been called strikes by umpire Mike Dimuro, including a first-inning third-strike call that would have been ball four—snapped, “That was off the plate!” after a similar third-strike call in the seventh inning.

Still, when asked about the pitches after the game, Coghlan demurred.
“I don’t want to talk about the strike zone, because that’s a discredit to what (Halladay) did,” he said in the MLB.com report. “He was moving the ball all over, to both sides of the plate. Even when he got to 2-2, 3-2, he was able to locate offspeed pitches. He threw a great game.”

Opposing jinxes
While teammates are expected to refrain from jinxing greatness, the same criteria needn’t apply to the opposition. Gary Matthews reported that the Sun Life Stadium grounds crew, stationed near the dugout, spoke about the no-hitter with considerable volume, going so far as to ask Matthews if he was aware of it.

Meanwhile, reports Baseball Daily Digest, the Marlins’ TV crew did its part to jinx the effort on the air. (To be fair, they could be seen as simply doing their jobs as announcers. Read BDD’s account and judge for yourself.)

Fourth inning
This was the inning the Marlins’ TV announcers, Rich Waltz and Tommy Hutton, began to try to jinx the perfect game, saying that Halladay had been perfect thus far and that he’s never thrown a no-hitter.

Seventh inning
The Marlins TV announcers’ jinx was in full effect. They began to show highlights of Dallas Braden’s perfect game. It became clear to me that when you TRY to jinx something, it really doesn’t work.

Eighth inning
Now the TV announcers are doing whatever they can do, bringing up the fact that Halladay has never thrown a no-hitter and that in his second ever start, he had a no-hitter going with two outs in the ninth when Bobby Higginson hit a solo homerun.

It can be argued that Marlins manager Fredi Gonzalez fit into this category by sending three straight pinch-hitters to the plate in the ninth, in an effort to get to Halladay. Should the score have been 4-0, this could have been seen as a clear sign of disrespect for the moment. Because it was a 1-0 game, however, Gonzalez had wide-reaching Code immunity to do whatever he felt gave his team the best chance to get back into the game.

Update: McCarthy on TV, and Philadelphia’s radio play-by-play man, Scott Franzke, discussed the stresses of calling a perfect game with The Sporting News.

McCarthy: As for the superstitions, I don’t get caught up in them because I think it would be a disservice to the listeners or the viewers. I didn’t want to pound the fact that it was a perfect game, but I always feel like it is important to tell the story. You have to. I think I said no-hitter a few times and perfect game twice, but I didn’t say it over and over again. I have always felt that way. I thought the video [the telecast showed video of Jim Bunning’s perfect game for the Phillies] was important to put the outing into perspective and I was excited that we had it handy. With all of that said, I did stay in the booth the whole time and not move.

Franzke: I don’t think I shied away from saying the actual words. It’s funny that I mention it a number of times that he’s been perfect. I can’t tell you when I might have said the words perfect game together. I sit next to, obviously, an ex-player and he has a lot of things ingrained in his mind – in terms of Larry Anderson – from the days of being on a bench and being with guys who may be in the process of throwing a no-hitter. He’s got certain superstitions, but I’ve always said, look, especially on radio, there’s just no way around it. You have to say it. You have to let people know what’s going on. You have to understand that two-thirds of your audience at any given moment are either turning on the radio or turning off the radio. They are getting in and out of their cars, by and large, so you have to make them aware, constantly, of what’s going on.

Again, I don’t know whether I did it enough, whether I do it too much, but I certainly don’t try to avoid saying the words just because of a ball player’s superstition or whatever superstition the fans have.

– Jason

2
This Week in the Unwritten Rules

This Week in the Unwritten Rules

Posted on by Jason Turbow

May 23
Visual evidence emerges that players have, in the past, run across the pitcher’s mound.

May 24
Ozzie Guillen claims that offenses should shut down as early as the fourth inning. Then he emphasizes his point.

May 24
The juncture at which an umpire issues a warning can make a significant difference in the way the unwritten rules play out, or not.

May 25
Two more intra-squad squabbles—between Albert Pujols and Tony La Russa, and Francisco Rodriguez and Randy Niemann—add to the rash of such incidents so far this season.

May 26
Adrian Beltre explains that players go to extra lengths when it comes to doing things like helping preserve a no-hitter.

May 27
Bengie Molina has a lack of speed, not a lack of feelings—as he lets ESPN know.

May 28
Ted Lilly is called out for pitching from in front of the pitcher’s rubber. “Talk about adding a yard to your fastball,” wrote Whitey Ford about the practice.

May 28
ESPN’s Eduardo Perez offers a mini-primer on how to talk to umpires.

May 29
Colorado’s Ryan Spilborghs swung at the first pitch after teammates had hit back-to-back home runs . . . and hit a home run. One reader to this blog is out a steak because of it.

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Don't Swing on the First Pitch After Back-to-Back Home RUns, Ryan Spilborghs

Spilborghs Swings at First Pitch after Back-to-Back Jacks; Costs Reader Beef

Posted on by Jason Turbow

Welcome to the Memorial Day edition of the Reader Mailbag. This is the first one we’ve ever done.

Dear Mr. Turbow:

My name is Michael Baker and I live in Denver, Colorado. I recently read your article about the “Unwritten Rules of Baseball.”

I thoroughly enjoyed your article, especially Unwritten Rule #1- Don’t Swing at the First Pitch After Back-to-Back Home Runs.

After the Rockies hit back-to-back jacks yesterday I stood up and told my three buddies about “Rule #1.” I then guaranteed, and even bet one guy a steak dinner, that the next batter would not swing at the first pitch. Two seconds later, Ryan Spilborghs swung at the first pitch and crushed a ball over the left field fence.

I humbly request that you send me a check for $150 to cover my expenses as I buy my friend a steak dinner and to compensate me for my humiliation, pain and suffering.

Please mail the check to:

Mr. Michael Baker
XXXXX
Greenwood Village, CO

The check does not have to be certified, I know you are good for it. Cash is acceptable as well.

I can provide wire instructions if that is easier for you.

Sincerely Yours,

Michael  Baker

Michael,

I’m sorry to hear about your lost wager. Steak dinners can be precious commodities.

Unfortunately, I’m merely the messenger for the Code, and am unable to enforce its adherence among the major league ranks.

The notion is to give a touch of professional courtesy to a pitcher who is clearly struggling–a single pitch with which to find his focus and right his ship. It’s known as a “courtesy take,” and it was especially prominent with Sparky Anderson and his Big Red Machine teams of the 1970s.

“Let him know, okay, I’m not swinging,” said Hal McRae, who played on those Cincinnati ballclubs. “I know you’re out there trying to do a job.”

These days, fewer players follow this piece of code. The instance in question also contains some gray area: When Spilborghs came to the plate, the Rockies held a five-run lead in the seventh. In Coors Field, that’s hardly considered safe. Spilborghs can be justifiably criticized for lack of decorum, but so too can he mount a defense that the score was close enough to attack the opposition in any way he could.

Colorado visits San Francisco this Monday. I’ll try to track down the perpetrator for comment at some point during the series.

As you dine, please try not to think of opportunities lost, but of friendships gained through the purveyance of beef.

And thanks for reading.

– Jason

4
Umpire Relations

How to Talk to Umpires

Posted on by Jason Turbow

In the wake of two umpire-related events last week—Bob Davidson’s blowout with Joe Maddon, and Joe West ejecting Ozzie Guillen and Mark Buehrle over two disputed balk calls—former big leaguer Eduardo Perez (the son of Hall of Famer Tony Perez, who has managed in Puerto Rico and is an analyst for ESPN) offered up a brief tutorial on umpire relations, a topic with its own chapter in the unwritten rulebook.

Perez’s key points:

  • “Sometimes (as a manager) you know that the umpire made the right call, yet your player doesn’t seem to think so. In situations like that, you almost always still back your guy up because you don’t want to lose his trust.”
  • “Umpires don’t like it when players use their hands as a form of communication. They would rather have you yell at them than flail your arms because everything is on TV and it makes them look disrespected, like you’re showing them up.”
  • “If I disagreed with a strike call, I was taught to look down at the plate and be specific about what I saw: ‘Hey, I had that pitch 6 inches outside.’ Making eye contact and asking the umpire where the pitch was is the wrong move because you’re making more of a scene and questioning his judgment instead of confidently stating your own opinion.”

– Jason

1