Tim McClelland thought he had the right calls "in his heart"
Oct 21, 2009, 9:25 AM EST
Tim McClelland all but admits to the need for instant replay at the press conference after last night’s game:
As far as the two calls that I had at third base. The first one with Swisher leaving too soon. In my heart I thought he left too soon. On the play with Cano and Posada, I thought Cano was on the base. I was waiting for two players to be on the base, and when there was never the situation where both of them were on the base at the same time. When he tagged Cano, I thought Cano was on the base, and when Jorge touched the base and continued and tagged Posada out, I thought Posada was out.
After looking at replays, I’m not sure I believe the replay of the first one. I said in my heart I thought he left too soon. But the replay showed that he didn’t. We go in and watch replays regularly after every game, even during the regular season. That’s part of our procedures.
Then the second one it showed that Cano was off the bag when he was tagged. I did not see that for whatever reason. So obviously there were two missed calls. Obviously, or not obviously, but there were two missed calls.
And I’m just out there trying to do my job and do it the best I can. And unfortunately there was by instant replay, there were two missed calls.
Good for McClelland for admitting his mistakes. And for, however unwittingly, making the best case for the expansion of instant replay yet. Umpires can’t be making calls based on what’s “in their heart.” In each of these cases, the replay got it right, and even an umpire admits it.
Based on what we’ve seen this offseason, baseball can not deny the need to do something with respect to replay this winter.
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- Larry - Oct 21, 2009 at 9:45 AM
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Heres the problem with replay. An until its solved there will be no replay. Runners on first and second. Batter hits a line drive down the left field line. The ball is ruled foul, But replays show the ball was fair. Where do you put the runners? You cant assume a double. You cant assume the runner on second would score, while the runner on first ends up at third. You cant grant the batter a double becuase you cant assume that he would slide in safely to second. And you cant put him at first, because for all we know we would have slid safely into second.
Using instant replay creates to many assumptions. Before you say so what, remember that this is a league that doesn’t even assume the double play on routine grounders.
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- bh0673 - Oct 21, 2009 at 9:54 AM
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Tim McClellan has been around a long time and for the most part has been very good. He was the umpire in the pine tar game and although that call was over turned it was accurate
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- Anthony - Oct 21, 2009 at 10:05 AM
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I am for instant replay for one reason: The money involved in the sport. People aren’t playing baseball because they love it. They are playing baseball because they love it AND they love the paycheck. If teams and players are making millions of dollars a year then I think every tool should be used to ensure the right calls are made.
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- Old Gator - Oct 21, 2009 at 10:44 AM
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What Tim McClelland has in his heart and four and a half bucks will buy a San Andreas Angel of Anaheim an iced cappuccino at Starbucks.
McClelland should consider himself lucky that he’s working the ALCS. If he were in Philadelphia, he’d've eaten a couple of those horrible horsemeat and velveeta sandwiches they make up there and he’d have a nice thick layer of cholesterol plaque lining his ventricles to go with his good intentions.
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- chrabosh - Oct 21, 2009 at 10:44 AM
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The call first call at 3rd base evened out, Swisher was out by a foot on the pickoff on 2nd but was called safe, he left on time at 3rd but was called out….two crap calls off set each other….let’s move on
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- Terry Gaines - Oct 21, 2009 at 10:47 AM
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Instant replay only way to go as long as there are no stupid delays in the game it should be resonable only like in the NFL.
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- dave - Oct 21, 2009 at 10:47 AM
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Seems to me the umpires can not even get the Ball and strikes correct. That is if the electronic box on the screen is correct where the ball went. But the biggest BS is their arrogance about their decision and refusal to ask for help. Remember the homerun in yankee stadium the kid touched and the umpire ruled a home run he was so damn sure the kid never touched it.Instant replay in the booth if a team will challenge the call. If the team is wrong it will cost them an out. The play goes on as if fair all the time.
But the big thing in my opinion MLB needs for the yankees to win the series. And I think right now they are playing the best ball of all teams. But they do not need an ump on their side.
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- Noah - Oct 21, 2009 at 10:48 AM
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They get paid the same whether replay or not. Instant replay would cause too many problems. Having umps make occasional mistakes is considered part of the game, it’s the human element and sometimes it’s not fair.
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- BklynBirny - Oct 21, 2009 at 10:48 AM
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I think we can all agree that the umpiring has been pathetic. But that does NOT mean that we need expanded video review. What we need are better umpires!
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- Justin - Oct 21, 2009 at 10:52 AM
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While I am pleased to see an umpire admit his mistakes, the calls from last night’s game were shocking, and, even more so, was the lack of calling them out by the broadcasters. I was waiting for one of them to say that it seemed as if they were watching a Little League game with the missed calls, but that never came. I understand why Joe Buck wouldn’t, as a career broadcaster, but I thought that Tim McCarver would have had the courage to state what was going on and the lack of quality.
I completely understand the difficulty with umpiring plays where the runners are moving quickly and calls have to be made in the blink of an eye – the plays at home plate were, as confirmed by replay, completely accurate and, in my opinion, more difficult than any of the calls at 2nd or 3rd – these umpires who work in the LCS games are supposed to be the “best of the best” and their performance last night was sorely lacking. Swisher was picked off at 2nd, Posada and Cano were both tagged out, and Swisher successfully tagged up at 3rd and should have scored. While judgements will always be made by officials in any sport, instant replay is coming online in some form or fashion and I think that MLB should push past any resistance to permit some sort of challenge system where managers can challenge two plays a game, and, like the NFL, if you lose, you lose an out; if you win, the correct call is enforced.
No matter how you slice it, it’s a difficult job but one that should be done as accurately as possible with all available tools. [For the record, I'm a life-long NYY fan.]
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- Ray - Oct 21, 2009 at 10:52 AM
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Larry – I agree with your comments about some types of plays have a difficult reslolution of whether the runner should be on one or another base. But a corrected ruling based on instant replay is still better than allowing the wrong decision.
I like the football solution of giving each manager a couple of flags to use throughout the game on rulings they want to challenge, except balls and strikes. The refs should also be allowed to use the replay if they think they might need a review.
As far as balls and strikes accuracy, which is missed on almost every batter according to the strike zone rectangle shown on TV, that is easily done with the technical advancements of today, similar to the tennis in/out rulings. The homw umpire remains there just for hit batsman, player infractions, and other non ball/strike needs.
Now you have a far more accurate ballgame played in every stadium everyday – tradition is not as important as getting it right. Otherwise, all the other advances in technology used in the game would not be used.
Ray
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- Gejrom - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:01 AM
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REfs getting old!
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- Church of the Perpetually Outraged - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:02 AM
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You bring up a great point about replay that, believe it or not, Joe Morgan, rightly, has actually been championing for a few years now. However, the anticipation of one unfortunately instance does not preclude MLB from expanding replay in other instances. Each blown call last night was another example of where IR could have been used. Also, it would have taken maybe a combined 30 sec to overturn each call (granted the tag up wouldn’t have occurred if Swisher was correctly ruled out at 2nd).
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- skildude - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:03 AM
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The blown call on 3rd only made up for the blown call at 2nd that occurred 1 batter before where swisher was clearly off the base when he was tagged out. yet nobody made mention of this
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- Jason - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:07 AM
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You raise good points but football has the same issues. What happens when the ref rules the play dead and reply shows a clear fumble? You cannot award the other team the ball and assume the person who picked it up and ran 30 yards downfield for a TD would have done that. The refs blew the whistle so most players stop play. The stopping of play maybe added 20 extra yards and the TD. So you cannot award 10 yards because you think he would have only gone that far You cannot also rule a fumble and spot the ball at the spot of the fumble, it is not fair for the team who recovered. Thus they simply call the play dead, and rule no replay is allowed.
I would assume the same applies here in theory, that reply should be used ONLY in certain situations.
like:
-Was runner out at first via a throw from third?
-Did runner tag up after the ball was caught?
-Were both players on the bag, one or none?
-was runner picked off?
-Did runner slide under a tag at home?
I would hate to see reply used for balls and strikes, foul or not (except home runs) hits, etc. As you say some situations are too crazy and require people to make crazy judgment calls about what might have happened.
And with everything as the reply evolves, it will get smarter and more accurate.
My big issue is the stoppage of play and time delay. Red Sox Yankees games are already over 3 hours during the reg season (each seems like a playoff game) and reply would make it even longer.
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- Ryan - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:08 AM
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There’s no problem with where to put the runner…just make it a ground rule double. That’s what you do on a ball down the line that a fan intereferes with. You can’t assume a double there either. You can’t even assume a double on a ball that bounces over the wall.
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- Larry - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:12 AM
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Thanks for the comments, I am not opposed to instant replay, but the problems I stated before is not a remote possibility and is likely to occur. The problem with instatnt replay is what do you do if the play is ruled foul and it wasnt. A foul call ends the play.
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- Ryan - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:16 AM
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Like I said, it’s not a dilemma.
95% of the time, a ball down the line is a double. In rare cases, it’s only a single, or a triple. It all evens out, you call it a ground rule double.
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- Dave - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:22 AM
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Okay, two things—first, there should not be a limit on replay challenges in any sport—that is saying, the accuracy of the call is only important if the team that gets screwed has timeouts left.
And what if the final out of an inning in baseball is the one that gets challenged? Would the team challenging the call (if not right) start the next inning with one out already on the board?
Point is, we should use IR in every case that we can. The accuracy of the calls is the important facet, not the human element. When the 49ers and the Vikings played in the NFL, week 4 i think, the 9ers had no challenges left to review a call that would have awarded them posession, but the clock was at 2:45 seconds. Had the play happened 45 seconds later, it would have been replayed by the booth. So this says that only if a play happens within the last 2 minutes, is the call more important than the teams timeout standing.
As children playing sports are always told, each play is as important as the play before and after it. We should hold our officials, and their calls, to the same standard.
If a play is wrong, and the whole world can see it on their HDTVs, it should not be allowed to stand. The leagues (plural–ALL OF THEM), need to use a remote live replay system. If a call is wrong, the official is alerted, the correct call is told to them, the change is announced, and play moves on. No referee under a hood for 5 minutes, no waiting for officials to conference with one another wasting another 4 minutes. Just the right call. In a timely fashion. In this age of technology, fans should be able to demand at least that much (and also ticket prices to drop by 50+%, but I wont be too greedy–just get the damn calls right.)
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- Scott - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:22 AM
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Runners can always be moved back if the play continues and you have an override (foul ball).
I believe the way to proceed is to have the umpires down the line signal fair if they cannot make a “clear / instant” decision. Allow play to continue and reset (move the runners back) if video shows conclusively a foul ball.
I agree with you, if it’s stopped instantly nothing can be done.
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- Woodmont - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:26 AM
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The so-called human element can no longer be considered a part of the game because a hundred million people can see the mistake seconds later.
There should be an instant replay umpire in a special booth at all games and the same quick decisions that are made in tennis can be made in baseball. All disputed calls in the field except balls and strikes should be subject to review.
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- oswegosteve - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:29 AM
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Bottom line – Yankees scored 10 runs…… neither of his mistakes would have changed the results dramatically enough to change the result of the game….. Umpires are human…there have been mistakes worse than the ones last night made throughout the history of the game (the Royals / Cardinals world series comes to mind…play at first base..)…having replays slows the game down and, quite honestly, there are going to be cases where even replays wont definitively prove a call one way or the other….
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- Steve - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:31 AM
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For several years now, the umpires for the post-season are not the “best of the best.” The umpires’ union had that changed a couple of contracts ago and they are rotated on a regular basis and merit has not bearing on their selection.
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- Ken - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:35 AM
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Two wrongs don’t make a right. You still have two blown calls.
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- Bobmala - Oct 21, 2009 at 11:41 AM
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Clearly 2 blown calls, luckily didn’t affect the outcome of the game. However, gotta give McClelland some credit, so few umps would ‘man up’ and actually admit he blew them.
