POLL: Did Umpire Jerry Meals Make The Right Call To End Tuesday’s Braves-Pirates Game?

If, like me, you turned off Tuesday night’s Braves-Pirates game prematurely because a) it was bedtime and b) between the horrible strike-calling and the kid in the stands who was shrieking “LET’S GO PIRATES” for four innings straight, it was perhaps the most annoying game in baseball history, this is the game-ending play you missed:

I encourage you to vote, but before you do, I encourage you to consider a couple of things. Meet me after the jump.

Our instincts compel us to immediately and decisively call the runner, Julio Lugo, out. The throw beat him by a mile, and Lugo’s own body language suggests that he believes he’s out. As our own Rob Neyer notes, though, that doesn’t necessarily mean anything.

Yeah, I know Lugo behaved as if he were out. Players do that all the time. Sometimes they just don’t know. Sometimes they assume they’re out because the throw beat them by 10 feet. Usually they’re right. Not always.

I’m also reminded of something I saw a few weeks ago on Chitwood & Hobbs. Here’s an anecdote from the retired Bret Boone:

”Bo Jackson was on first base and we picked him off. He didn’t even try to go back to first; he just took off running to second. They threw the ball to me and we had him out by 15 feet. But Bo is still running at me full steam. I’m thinking, ‘You’ve got to get in a rundown, dude.’ But he’s running like he’s going to run me over at the plate. I’m thinking, ‘What are you doing, dude? Well, I guess he’ll slide.’

But then he’s five feet away and he’s still in full stride. And I’m like, ‘Holy s---, what the hell’s going to happen?’ And I jumped back out of the way. And then he came to the base at full speed and went ‘pop!’ -- stopped right on the bag. He was safe, but they called him out because the ball beat him.

That’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen. I had the ball 15 feet before he got there, waiting for him, and he made me not tag him. He said to me, ‘Boonie, you know I was safe.’ I said, ‘You’re right.’ He just scared me.”

The unsurprising, but interesting, element of this story is that Bo didn’t seem to take issue to actually being called out. Even though he knew he was actually safe, he knew he was “out,” simply because the throw beat him and that’s what happens when the throw beats you.

The question, then, might be this: would you be okay with Lugo being called out, not because it would be the technically correct call, but on the basis of the “the throw beat you, dude, you’re out” principle? I suspect that some would be.

Anyway. Vote!