It's never too late and to invoke a cliche sometimes good things take time. Case in point is Detroit Tiger pitcher Armando Galarraga's perfect game...his perfect game that wasn't a perfect game but that was. It is now April of 2011 and a new MLB season has begun. Galarraga threw that perfect game on June 2 last season but still hasn't been credited with it. But he still could be and should be.
Brief History of the Perfect Game in Baseball
Here's some background: Major League Baseball started in 1876 - the National League then, American League in 1901 – and it took 134 years to produce 19 perfect games. On average that's one perfect game each 7 years. It then took only twenty days to go from perfect game number 19 on May 9 2010 (Dallas Braden of Oakland) to perfect game number 20 on May 29 (Roy Halladay of the Phillies).
Astonishingly it then took but three more days to get to perfect game number 21, the perfect game that wasn't a perfect game but that was, the one Armando Galarraga threw. And even if it takes seven years to get it into the record books MLB needs to do the right thing.
Tigers Pitcher Armando Galarraga's Perfect Game
Here's a recap: on that June night in Detroit, Galarraga retired his first 26 straight batters before Cleveland's Jason Donald hit a routine grounder to the right of first baseman Miguel Cabrera. Next up came the first baseman to pitcher play, worked on countless times every spring training: Cabrera fielded and flipped to Galarraga and, as replays show, Galarraga's foot clearly stepped on the bag before Donald’s. Out! Perfect game number 21! Right? Wrong: umpire Jim Joyce threw his arms up and made – the safe sign.
After the game Joyce looked at the replay in the umpires' locker room and was reported to have been distraught. The veteran umpire admitted that he blew it, later telling the media that “...it was the biggest call of my career, and I kicked the (expletive) out of it. I just cost that kid a perfect game." He did for now but it doesn't have to stay that way.
Galarraga Threw 21st Perfect Game
Commissioner Bud Selig and the league could still step in to change the ruling and make the record books say that Donald was out and give to Galarraga his first perfect game and the first in Tigers franchise. The next batter grounded out to end the game, the 3-0 score unaffected by the incorrect call. You think Jason Donald would complain about losing a hit that was not a hit? It is certain that Jim Joyce wouldn't argue the call, he's on record as saying he'd like to see it reversed.
The night that it happened many have suggested baseball should change the ruling. Tiger players continue to say they played a perfect game, regardless of what the record books say, and the pitcher himself, who has taken it all well, is on record as saying that he can tell his son that he pitched a perfect game.
Even Yankee manager Joe Girardi said after his game in New York on that night he would support giving to Galarraga what he deserves. “I think it’s something that baseball should look at possibly because if they do change it, it doesn’t affect the game. It doesn’t affect the outcome," he told media.
Replays in Major League Baseball
The incident sparked another round of debate about extending the use of replays in baseball but that is separate to what needs to be done. Changing the ruling will not establish a precedent and there is no slippery slope to fall down. After all, when is it likely that another perfect game will be lost on the 27th batter to a call which the umpire admits he "kicked the (expletive) out of?"
In 134 years and 23 days?
"I know it would be the first time it's ever happened," Girardi said that night of righting the wrong and giving Galarraga his due. "But you're talking about a pretty unusual circumstance."
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