MLB Replay - Part II - It won't disturb the game as we know it...

Two comments in last week's announcement by MLB, about the implementation of expanded replay beginning this year, caught my attention.  The first, by MLB reporter Paul Hagan:

“The way baseball games are governed on the field changed dramatically Thursday.”

The very next statement by the commish, Bud Selig went like this:

“I’m proud of the changes we’ve made…because they won’t disturb the game as we know it.”

Hmm, pondering both of these statements made me think of that line in the Dire Straits song “Industrial Disease”, “two men say they’re Jesus, one of them must be wrong…” On the surface the first is about officiating, the second about the game itself, but you really can’t change one without affecting the other.  I touched upon the cost of this change as it might affect umpiring in my last blog entry and now I want to consider Selig’s statement.  “…won’t disturb the game as we know it.” 

The game as we know it?  You mean the uniquely American game we call our "national pastime?” Where the seemingly wronged manager argues passionately and quite possibly until his figurative death…because nothing is more deeply rooted in our founding fathers’ idealism than a healthy mistrust of a single authoritative figure with absolute power and nothing is more American than getting in that last word, even at the expense of our own demise?    

Of course, the harsh reality is that for all of baseball’s history, there’s no finer example of tyrannical rule than that of a baseball umpire.  You see, as much as it is the American game, baseball has long employed freedom-of-speech, but without the aide of rule-of-law and due process, until now.  Starting in 2014, instead of rushing out of the dugout like it's Lexington and Concord all over again, the calm, cool and collected skip will take a leisurely stroll to the crew-chief and rather than bring the ump’s mom into the conversation, will simply ask, “I’d like to go to the tape for that call and by the way, how’s the wife Tim?”

In the end, the managers will now have their say; “truth, justice and the American way” will prevail, like it's supposed to.  This will make for a cleaner and more civilized game – one that I agree with – but you can’t say the game, "as we know it" won’t be "disturbed" Mr Selig.  That's just marketing puffery.  A more honest statement would have pointed out that while it makes sense to use available technology to ensure game changing calls are correct, we have to accept that it does tinker with the game's DNA and that's a price we're willing to accept.

Somewhere Earl Weaver is arguing with an angel and I don’t mean the Los-Anaheim-geles kind.

Next up will be Part III, the practical matter of how IR will be implemented.

Jim Tosches is an amateur umpire and blogger in Encinitas, Ca and author of the book, "The Rules Abide: The Thinking Fan's Guide to Baseball Rules (With History, Humor and a Few Big Words)"

www.amazon.com/dp/149224175x