dear MLB: go toward the light

Thank god for lunch (half) hours. If I didn’t get this out, I was going to explode.

In the wake of Galarraga’s stolen perfect game, there are a lot of rampant emotions, many unkind words, and a few facts:

1. Indians shortstop Jason Donald was out at first base.
2. Jim Joyce mistakenly called him safe.
3. After the fact, all rational parties (including players on both teams, Joyce, the blogosphere, Major League Baseball, both my dead grandmothers, and Donald himself) all agreed that the call was wrong.
4. MLB Commissioner Bud Selig had the opportunity to reverse the on-field call and award Galarraga the perfect game he and the Tigers had earned.
5. Selig whiffed.

Maybe it’s the hockey fan in me, maybe it’s that I spent too much time last night on Twitter. Whatever the case, I couldn’t help compare the situation unfolding in baseball with the way previous controversies have been handled in the NHL. It’s an interesting point/counterpoint study, actually. . .

On the one hand, you have the NHL, which consistently gets it wrong despite having the most advanced instant replay technology in existence — not to mention a war room of “experts” reviewing each play seconds after it happens. You have a league that upholds botched calls and clings to the fallacy that its officials are untouchable, rather than acknowledging the truth: that they’re humans trying to make 1,000 right calls each period, in a game that moves at a breakneck speed. You have officials who seem to feel empowered by the league’s protection, and who refuse to admit when they’ve blown a call — even when it makes the difference in a game, a playoff series, or a Stanley Cup.

On the other hand, you have Jim Joyce, a veteran umpire of 22 years and the unlucky guy who made the Bad Call Heard ‘Round the World. A guy who almost immediately admitted he got it wrong and expressed overwhelming sadness, remorse and shame. A guy who knows his name will forever be linked with the call and its subsequent maelstrom of controversy, even if the MLB were to overturn his on-field call and award Galarraga a perfect game. A guy who has shown nothing but class to the media, to the fans, and to the man whose moment he irrevocably (if unintentionally) stole.

Even if league commissioner Bud Selig had overturned Joyce’s call, the moment has passed. Galarraga and the Tigers will never have the cathartic moment of pure emotion and adrenaline to celebrate with each other, and with their 40,000 fans. Galarraga will always know he pitched a perfect game; the 2010 Detroit Tigers will always know they backed him up with offense and airtight fielding. But the moment of savoring just the 21st perfect game in baseball’s century-long history is gone.

Joyce knows that. He’s fully aware that in those three seconds he became the most mocked and cursed at man in baseball since Bartman donned a turtleneck and headphones. Yet he hasn’t hid behind a title or the league or his tenure; instead, he began beating himself up over it almost immediately, saying: “It was the biggest call of my career and I kicked the shit out of it. I just cost that kid a perfect game.” If you don’t feel for him at this point, then man are you dark. Refusing to hide from the repercussions of Wednesday’s call, Joyce returned to Comerica Park today as home plate umpire and teared up again when Galarraga brought him the starting lineup for a Jim Leyland-orchestrated Kodak moment. Whatever Jim Joyce has done in his umpiring life before June 2, 2010, this incident has proven he is a class act.

Human error happens. It’s part of sports, and of life, and it will never — should never — completely be eradicated. Without human error, we become a nation of automatons. It’s the ability to recognize, own up to, and respond to human error that truly shows character.

Commissioner Selig and Major League Baseball got it wrong today. Galarraga and the Tigers will have to settle for the notorious distinction of being the only team to have a perfect game spoiled by an umpire error, rather than a feat by either team. And a good man will ever-after be defined by one mistake, which is a damn shame.

Selig’s statement, while not deigning to mention his authority to reverse the rotten result, indicates changes may be on the horizon for the league: “Given last night’s call and other recent events, I will examine our umpiring system, the expanded use of instant replay and all other related features. Before I announce any decisions, I will consult with all appropriate parties, including our two unions and the Special Committee for On-Field Matters, which consists of field managers, general managers, club owners and presidents.”

Baseball fans of every stripe should pray the MLB doesn’t follow the lead of the NHL. Replays are useless if you choose to buffer bad calls with silence and excuses. If Selig and the league want to maintain baseball’s integrity, I urge them to look no further than to Galarraga, Joyce and the fans in Detroit — and the lessons are pretty straightforward: Own your mistakes. Don’t let your ego make you believe you’re bigger than the sport. And always — always — remember that leadership and sportsmanship are powerful examples that should be set by everyone involved in the game, whether player, umpire, sportscaster or fan.

“Perfect” game or no, I’m proud to be a Tigers fan today.

endless summer nights: a tribute to ernie harwell

It was the summer of 1984. I was eight years old, living in Royal Oak and spending my days romping up and down the block with the dozen or so kids who formed the core of our extended Roseland family. After putting in long hours hopping fences, making sandbox villages for matchbox cars, or building forts in the off-limits backyard of Nora’s neighbor, the streetlights would come on and it was time to haul ass home before Liz’s two-fingered whistle sounded from the porch.

If you’re not from southeast Michigan, you may not know that it gets about a full hour more daylight than Chicago in the summer, by virtue of their locations in their respective time zones. (I’ve contended for years that we in Chicago get screwed by being just a hair from the Eastern time zone border.) As a result, it’s not unusual to have daylight right up until 10 p.m. when summer’s at its peak.

For an eight-year-old, there’s something deeply incongruous and unfair about being sent to bed while the sun’s still up. And it should come as no surprise to those who know my parents that they were sticklers. Until I was 12 and finally deemed old enough to stay up late enough for “Moonlighting” — and, therefore, moon lighting — it was often pointless to try to sleep before it was good and dark. So night after warm, humid summer night, I would settle into bed in the company of my current book and the voice of the Detroit Tigers — the voice of Ernie Harwell — on the AM dial.

That summer (and for many summers to follow), Harwell’s hypnotic play-by-plays and the lulls in between poured through the tinny speakers of my dad’s ancient clock radio and found a happy rhythm with the hum of cicadas and drone of the floor fan stirring the air in my upstairs bedroom. It was the summer of Sparky Anderson and 35-5 and “Bless You Boys,” the last summer the Tigers won it all and took Detroit on an amazing ride along the way. It was the summer I learned what it meant to be a sports fan and love a team to your core, and Harwell was a critical part of that education.

Daytime games were more often the domain of George Kell and Al Kaline (“Hello, everybahddy. . .”), but Harwell was my link to the past-my-bedtime night games, and I loved him for that. Years later, after my Tigers fanaticism had cooled to merely faithful support, I still sought out Harwell on the dial during long drives home to Chicago after a weekend with my family in Michigan. Two or three words of broadcast are all it would take to bring me right back to childhood.

I loved Ernie for that, too.

As soon as news of his sad, but not unexpected death was released tonight, it hit the internet with force. Harwell’s name swiftly began trending on Twitter and one by one, a huge chunk of my Facebook contacts updated their statuses to reflect the loss. Over and over, people echoed similar sentiments: Harwell was the voice of our childhood. The voice of summer. The ideal sound to gently lull a wound-up kid into a state of relaxation — and a lifelong love of baseball.

How many of us cut our teeth on the game to the tones of Ernie Harwell describing another beautiful double play turned by Trammell and Sweet Lou? An impossible strike-out by Hernandez? A Gibby homer? How many nights did Harwell’s soft, southern drawl spin images of plays that became crystal clear in our minds?

How many of us will never listen to the game of baseball the same way again?

Ernie lived a terrifically long and rich life, and he fought a good fight against a vicious form of cancer. The Free Press published a lengthy, moving tribute to him shortly after the news broke — the kind of piece you know has been researched and written for months now, just waiting for its unfortunate publication date. I definitely learned things I never knew, and it’s a good read for any Michigan sports fan.

For me, Ernie Harwell will always be the sound of my dad working in the yard on a Saturday while I played on the swing set. He’ll always be the commentary that rose and fell as I dozed in and out of sleep in the back seat on drives home from my grandparents’ house in Detroit. And, most of all, Ernie will always be the voice of the endless summer nights of my childhood.

Rest in peace, Ernie. And thank you for keeping all of us company — you did a damn fine job.