Class All Around

Well, today was the aftermath of the Perfect Game That Wasn't from last night in Detroit, and I tuned in to the opening of the Tigers-Indians game to see what would transpire next.

I have to say that umpire Jim Joyce handled the whole thing with a lot of dignity and class. He admitted his mistake, apologized to Armando Galarraga, and faced the media and took their questions. I have to say he is a man who has taken his medicine.

Armando Galarraga comes out the best in this whole thing. He met with Joyce, accepted his apology and basically is moving on. He has gained big time brownie points for handling the whole thing like a professional. He will be remembered even more for the way he handled the mistake than he would have had the call gone the right way.

Today, Joyce was the home plate ump in the finale of the Indians-Tigers game, and Galarraga brought out the lineup card for the Tigers. He met with Joyce, and they warmly greeted each other. Joyce was clearly upset by the previous night's missed call, and looked like he was ready to break down. It was still a great scene, and everyone associated with it came off very well.

Here's video of it from ESPN.

MLB is looking into the whole scenario, and there are calls to bring more instant replay and also to officially make last night's game a perfect game in the record books. I'm not in favor of that, as it opens up a can of worms that MLB may regret. I believe that we all have to live with the consequences of Joyce's decision and move on.

And as far as more instant replay goes, MLB games are long enough, and more replay will simply drag games out much further. I'm sure there will be thousands of ideas at a solution to these problems.

But despite the way it played out today, MLB still has a huge problems with its umpires. There are still way too many incompetent umps out there, some who have little idea of what a real strike zone is, a few with hidden agendas, etc. Jim Joyce may have saved his job by the way he handled the whole thing, but too many out there just aren't any good any more (and some were never any good to begin with).

And I'm sure we'll revisit this whole thing again the next time a crucial call is blown by the men in blue.