This year’s baseball championship tournament’s had it all: great hitting performances, wacky weather, managerial acrobatics, walk-off drama, and a pair of incredibly unlikely participants, one of which one of which has qualified for the tournament finals.
Starting Pitchers Struggle, But Umpires Having Great October
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Two things we’ve not seen much of, though? Outstanding performances by starting pitchers, and egregious umpiring.
The first of those, you might miss. The second of those, not so much.
In Games 3 and 4 of the 2008 World Series, the umpires blew two calls.
Throughout the 2009 postseason, umpires were blowing calls left and right; the worst probably came in Game 4 of the ALCS, when veteran Tim McClelland missed two calls at third base, including what one wag described as “the worst call of all time”.
Just last year, the Twins were the victims of poor umpiring in their Division Series loss to the Yankees. To their credit, the Twins didn't make a lot of excuses, but Jeff Passan wrote an impassioned column about the poor umpiring in that series, and particularly about Hunter Wendelstedt's ridiculous strike zone in Game 2.
We’ve not been seeing those columns in 2011. Not yet, anyway.
Yes, Tim Welke had a rough game behind the plate in the ALCS opener, squeezing both Justin Verlander and C.J. Wilson. And yes, the umpires have missed some bang-bang plays on the bases (including this one in Game 6 of the NLCS the other night). But none of the games, let alone the series, have seemed to hinge on blown calls, and for the most part the umpires have done a fine job, both behind the plate and on the bases.
Has anything changed, systemically?
I doubt it. The umpires are supposedly selected on the basis of merit, but that was true in past years as well. Maybe there’s a little more of that this year, but that wouldn’t account for such a vast difference in results (as measured by our eyeballs, subjectively). I suspect the skills of this year’s crews are maybe a little better ... but that MLB can mostly just be grateful for good luck. And that we will see a badly blown call and a minor controversy at some point in the World Series.
So all you fans of the #humanelement hashtag on Twitter? Don't worry. It will be back, and probably sooner than most of us might like.
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