Quote of the Day (Zach Helfand, on the Umpire’s Strike Zone)

"For many years, an umpire’s strike zone was like an extension of his personality. Some umpires were literalists, uncompromising. Some preferred expediency; their boundaries were enormous. No matter who was working, when it rained suddenly everything was a strike. [Joe] West, the record-holding umpire, is a burly man with a Carolina drawl who moonlights as a country singer and used to pal around with Merle Haggard. He told me one umpire described the old standard for learning the strike zone as ‘You call them strikes until someone goes, “Hey!”’ Another of his friends liked to say, ‘The strike zone is like a television set, and every now and then you need [Hall of Fame Baltimore Orioles manager] Earl Weaver or Billy Martin’—the Yankees’ volatile manager in the seventies and eighties—'to come out and adjust the knob.’ Martin once sent an umpire a Christmas card that read ‘I hope you and your family have a wonderful holiday season.’ On the inside, he wrote, ‘Because you sure had a horseshit summer.’ Video evaluation has reined in some quirks, but the strike zone still changes measurably depending on the score, the team batting, and the pitcher’s race.”— Zach Helfand, “Invasion of the Robot Umpires,” The New Yorker, Aug. 30, 2021

You can be forgiven for thinking that in this offseason, San Francisco Giant manager Gabe Kapler might be sorely tempted to pull a Billy Martin and send Gabe Morales an unpleasant holiday greeting.

The first-base umpire did little to slow down—and, I’d wager, much to accelerate—the movement towards the video-evaluated decisions chronicled by Helfand in his New Yorker piece. In Thursday night’s deciding game of the Giants-L.A. Dodgers NLDS playoff series, Morales sent Wilmer Flores and the rest of the Giants to an aggravated, sorrowing postseason by calling a third, game- and series-ending strike on the first baseman.

Most of the rest of the civilized world believes that Flores checked his swing. That sentiment was not undercut in the slightest by Morales' feeble post-game explanation of his decision. ("I don’t have the benefit of multiple camera angles when I’m watching it live. When it happened live, I thought he went, so that’s why I called it a swing.")

The call certainly short-circuited any chance that Flores could have kept the rally alive long enough to tie the score, or maybe win the game. No amount of talk about how it was a game for the ages will salve the wounds of Giant fans.

Forget about masks, chest protectors, and leg guards: During a game, an umpire’s best equipment are ear plugs, so he won’t tune out insulting references by managers and fans to his ancestry. After a game, he is well advised to avoid any electronic medium that talks endlessly about the contest and his role in it.

Some years ago, an acquaintance of mine yelled out on behalf of her beloved Mets, “Hey ump, I’m blind, and even I can tell that was a ball!” Her taunt provoked much appreciative laughter and cheers at Shea Stadium back then. I suspect that from now on, more than a few Giant fans would echo her.

(The image accompanying this post, if you haven’t guessed, comes from Bull Durham, with Kevin Costner’s catcher Crash Davis being tossed from the game for arguing a call by an ump.)

This Day in Baseball History (Willie Mays, Bicoastal Giant Legend, Born)

May 6, 1931—Swift, smooth-fielding slugger Willie Mays was born in Alabama, in America’s most viciously segregated era—a long way from the East and West Coast cities where he broke through as perhaps the greatest in the first generation of African-American players.

Gotham fans of a certain age—or even those just fascinated by sports history—would tell you that the golden age of New York baseball lasted for a decade, from 1947 to 1957, and especially the last six years of that period. The city was big enough to hold three franchises: the Yankees in the American League, and, over in the National League, the New York Giants and the Brooklyn Dodgers. One, sometimes two, of these teams made it to the World Series in each of these 10 years. Not so coincidentally, all three teams had sluggers in center field, each with their own rabid fans: the oldest, Duke Snider, for the Dodgers; Mays, for the Giants; and a player who, like Mays, entered the major leagues with rookie travails in 1951, Mickey Mantle.

All these years later, I am not going to choose a “best” among these three magnificent center fielders who inspired countless arguments among midcentury New York fans about who was the greatest. I simply want to celebrate the achievement of one, Mays, who made a difference in the life of baseball and in two great American cities.

(One of those cities, let it be noted, was NOT Boston. While still holding out against integrating their team—a stance they would maintain until a dozen years after Jackie Robinson came to Brooklyn--the Red Sox sent a scout to assess Mays, then playing not far from where he grew up, with the Birmingham Black Barons. Mays, the scout reported, was not the Sox kind of player.  Undoubtedly, at least part of the reason why the Curse of the Bambino extended longer than it had to was because of the Curse of the Color Line in Beantown).

In one of his great columns in which he summed up a sports figure by addressing him in the second person, sportswriter Jimmy Cannon conveyed the magic that this gifted ballplayer held for countless city youths:

“You're Willie Mays of Fairfield, Ala., who is part of the small talk of New York. This shall be your city as long as your talent lasts….Kids forget the squalor of their childhood as they emulate the shambling urgency of your gait. They speak as though you lived on the same block with them.”

When you think about it, the time that Mays had to make his mark as a member of the New York Giants was relatively short compared with his entire career. He missed the 1952 and 1953 seasons entirely because of military service, and after 1958 he followed when the Giants left the Polo Grounds for San Francisco’s damp, foggy, windblown, altogether miserable Candlestick Park. He was not part of a New York team again until 1972 and 1973, when he played for the New York Mets, at a point when his considerable awareness of the subtleties of the game could not compensate for his declining physical skills and injuries.

That left 1951, when he earned National League Rookie of the Year honors despite not being called up till late May (and not getting a hit in his first 12 a-bats); 1954, when he became Most Valuable Player; and only three more full seasons in which he played the game with a flair never seen before and seldom if ever glimpsed since. 

Here was a player who could not only slug the ball out of the park but also run so fast that he’d lose his cap, who could catch flies with his unorthodox but devastatingly effective “basket catch,” and—in the 1954 World Series—sprint into the canyon of center field in the Polo Grounds to catch a line drive by Vic Wertz, haul it in with his back to the infield, then whirl around to fire perfectly to the cutoff man. (It’s a sign of Mays’ consistent brilliance that he doesn’t even regard this play—one so iconic that it’s known simply as “The Catch”—as his best.)

The fans could see what he was like on the field, where his skill was evident. What they could not see was his leadership in the clubhouse, where his ebullience, pragmatism, even temperament and intelligence at least kept teams from self-destruction, and occasionally (as in the ’62 and ’73 pennant races) helped his squads reach the World Series. A few examples will suffice:

* He helped the San Francisco Giants come from behind in the pennant race, then defeat the Los Angeles Dodgers in a best-two-of-three playoff series, in 1962, despite having to be hospitalized down the stretch from exhaustion;

*He staved off a rebellion two years later by African-American and Hispanic players angered by racially insensitive remarks by manager Alvin Dark, successfully arguing that, no matter how angry they might feel, forcing a mid-season managerial replacement could only lead to catastrophe;

*He was virtually the only player on the field to keep his head a year later when a benches-clearing brawl broke out between teammate Juan Marichal and Mays’ friend on the Dodgers, Johnny Roseboro—eventually managing to separate the two before a riot could have broken out; 

*He made a key speech to the executive board of the baseball players union in 1972, urging them to stick together on the eve of their strike; and 

*He joined teammate Tom Seaver and manager Yogi Berra, among others, in persuading Mets fans to allow the game to proceed after a nasty slide by Pete Rose into Bud Harrelson led to a bottle being thrown at Rose from left field and to the umpires threatening the Amazin’s with a forfeit in this bitterly contested 1973 playoff game.

There was another quality, over and above all of his leadership qualities, even, which Mays summed up this way during his induction speech into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1979:

“This country is made up of a great many things. You can grow up to be what you want. I chose baseball, and I loved every minute of it. I give you one word –love. It means dedication. You have to sacrifice many things to play baseball. I sacrificed a bad marriage and I sacrificed a good marriage. But I’m here today because baseball is my number one love.”

This Day in Baseball History (Marichal, Roseboro Brawl)

August 22, 1965—Cumulative tensions—from a duel of ace pitchers, from a white-knuckle pennant race, from a historic rivalry that hadn’t let up in intensity just because the two teams had relocated clear across the country from their New York beginnings—exploded in a 15-minute brawl between the San Francisco Giants and the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The nearly 43,000 Candlestick Park spectators and thousands more L.A. area TV viewers couldn’t believe what started it. First, there was an exchange of words between Giant pitcher Juan Marichal, taking his turn at bat, and Dodger catcher Johnny Roseboro; then Roseboro was on his feet with his mask off; then Marichal was hitting him on the head, twice, with his bat. (See the accompanying image.)

Across the nation, old baseball hands were trying to recall if they had ever witnessed another bat attack at the major league-level. They couldn’t.

A pitcher known for pinpoint control on the mound had completely lost it. What could have led him to do that?

Nothing raises ballplayers’ temperatures as much as the brushback pitch. Contemporary position players continue to take exception to it. It means a direct threat to their health (and—though not every player would admit to it—their continuing ability to amass millions in the free-agent market).

The brushback pitch was an even bigger part of the game in Marichal’s time. Pitchers such as Bob Gibson and Don Drysdale were unafraid to remind hitters that the strike zone belonged to them—all of it. Hitters crowding the plate received constant reminders that they did so at their own peril.

The Giant-Dodger rivalry had also featured this on prior occasions. Giant pitcher Sal Maglie became known as “The Barber” for his constant willingness to resort to “chin music.”

Pitchers’ ability to control the game became a central concern as Marichal faced off against the Dodgers’ Sandy Koufax that day 45 years ago today. Suspicions of tit-for-tat retaliation had been growing since the first of the four-game series two evenings before.

When Maury Wills’ bat had touched the glove of Giant catcher Tom Haller on the backswing, the Giants thought the Dodger speedster had leaned deliberately so that Haller would be called for catcher interference. Matty Alou‘s similar maneuver the next day did not earn him first base, as Wills had received, but it did raise the ire of Roseboro, who was behind the plate at that at-bat and yelled angrily at the Giant bench.

Tensions continued to mount on Sunday, as the Dodgers scored two quick runs in the first and second innings. Marichal, not only annoyed at Wills for his Friday maneuver but now for an attempt to bunt against himself, proceeded to flatten him his next turn up. Ron Fairly also got one high and inside.

As I write this, it occurs to me that the escalation of tensions between the Dodgers and Giants were a kind of small-scale version of those between the U.S. and the Soviet Union in that decade of the Cold War. Early on in this game, one player did his best to keep matters in check: Sandy Koufax.

Roseboro signaled for a “message pitch” in retaliation for Marichal making Wills hit the dirt. As Roseboro admitted later, he should have known better than to expect that from the great lefty. Koufax delivered the message a mile over the head of Marichal, who was never in from the great fireballer. (A good thing, too, since Koufax’s speed was such that serious damage could have occurred.)

"Koufax was constitutionally incapable of throwing at anyone's head," Roseboro wrote in his 1978 autobiography, "so I decided to take matters into my own hands."

On his throw back to Koufax, Roseboro whipped the ball within a millimeter of Marichal’s ear. The pitcher thought he’d been nicked. When he asked Roseboro why he’d done that, the catcher rose and moved toward him.

Marichal, believing that Roseboro was about to attack. launched a preemptive strike—make that two—with his bat. Then Roseboro had charged him, and the benches emptied.

Matters would have been far worse but for Giant superstar and captain Willie Mays. Wanting to end the fight before it got worse—and genuinely fearing for the safety of Roseboro, one of his best friends—he crossed team lines and pulled the catcher away from the melee, the blood from the wound staining his own uniform. Dodger outfielder Lou Johnson spoke for many when he said, “They can thank Mays that there wasn’t a real riot out there.”

To everyone’s relief, the attack, which opened up a two-inch gash at the top of Roseboro’s head, did not lead to a concussion for the veteran catcher. It did, however, affect the pennant race between the two teams, as well as perceptions of Marichal.

Marichal ended up being ejected, fined $1,750 and suspended eight games, meaning that he missed two starts. That year, the Giants ended up two games behind the Dodgers for the pennant. Naturally, many people have argued that Marichal could have been the equalizer in that race.

“Old School” blogger Robert Rubino of the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat has taken a contrarian position, noting that two Marichal losses down the stretch probably had more to do with the Giants’ disastrous slide that year than the righthander’s suspension.

Rubino is right, in the sense that wins in both games would have produced a tie (and, amazingly, a repeat of the “Miracle at Coogan’s Bluff Game” 14 years before ended by Bobby Thomson’s legendary home run). But, as provocative and well-argued as his position is, I don’t think it ends the matter.

Pitching rotations can be precarious, and a dependable starting pitcher’s absence can cause trouble (see, for instance, the heart palpitations produced in Rex Sox and Yankee fans by sidelined pitchers Josh Beckett and Andy Pettitte). It might have been worse in Marichal’s era, when four starters were the norm, than now, when five is the preferred number. Marichal’s absence forced manager Herman Franks to juggle the lineup, so that, in the immediate aftermath of the incident, the Giants went 4-12—a run that turned out to be unexpectedly costly in the end.

The incident also threatened, for awhile, to stain forever the reputation of Marichal. Previously known as the “Dominican Dandy” for his stylish, calm manner off the field, he now found himself tarred as a symbol of violence.

In his first two years of eligibility for the Baseball Hall of Fame, Marichal fell short of the required 75% of the vote. Based on statistics alone—a 16-year career that included a 243-142 record, a 2.89 ERA, 52 shutouts, 244 complete games and six 20-win seasons—and a reputation as the most dominant National League pitcher in the 1960s after Sandy Koufax and Bob Gibson—he should have been voted in on his first attempt.

The implication was inescapable: Cooperstown voters were still penalizing him for the fight. He had not been involved in similar controversial incidents after that, so it was beyond his own power at this point to sway voters in his favor.

The person who did so was Johnny Roseboro.

This was hardly an expected outcome for the first few years after the incident, when Roseboro pursued a $110,000 lawsuit against the pitcher, coming away with only a reported $7,000 in February 1970. Several years later, however, when Marichal was dealt to the Dodgers at the tail-end of his career, an assurance by Roseboro—by now retired—that he bore the pitcher no ill-will did much to assure acceptance by the Dodger “family.”

Several years later, meeting at an old-timers game, the two discussed the incident at length, then shook hands. The relationship grew steadily warmer as they met again at other old-timers games and charitable events.

After Marichal’s second failure to enter Cooperstown, Roseboro made clear, through public gestures—including posing with him and visiting him in the Dominican Republic—that he’d let bygones be bygones. The next election, Marichal finally made it to the Hall of Fame.

When Roseboro died in 2002, his widow asked Marichal to be a pallbearer at the funeral. In his eulogy, the Hall of Famer told fellow mourners that Roseboro's forgiveness was “one of the best things that happened in my life."

Today, in terms of the politics of the Hall of Fame, the closest thing to the Marichal-Roseboro controversy is the case of Roberto Alomar. Like Marichal, Alomar’s statistics placed him among the top five or so players at his position during his time. And, like Marichal, an ugly incident—spitting at umpire John Hirschbeck after a third-strike call, followed immediately after the game by an even uglier, personal reference to how Hirschbeck had become “real bitter” after his son’s death—left a terrible impression in the mind of the public and many potential Cooperstown voters.

Like Marichal, Alomar has made amends with his former adversary, including a donation to fight the disease that claimed Hirschbeck’s son.

I believe that, like Marichal, Alomar will eventually enter Cooperstown. Other factors, however, run the risk of delaying this a while longer. For one thing, he does not have Marichal’s basically warm disposition. For another, he did not win the approval of his teammates—nor leave the game with the grace--that Marichal summoned.

Giant teammates marveled at the way the righthander with the high kick looked out for them. And, in 1975, after two starts that left him believing he had come to the end of his career, the pitcher told Dodger president Peter O’Malley, “I can't take your money anymore if I can't pitch the way I want to."

In contrast, when he left the Mets following subpar seasons when his former skills had mysteriously disappeared, Alomar had acquired a reputation as an overpaid, sullen, toxic presence in the clubhouse. Moreover, a nasty recent lawsuit, in which an ex-girlfriend claimed the former athlete had unprotected sex with her despite being HIV-positive, has left a continuing cloud over his character.