That a boy Aaron! It’s time Major League Baseball umpires were put in their place. And your one game suspension was well worth making the statement.
With all of commissioner Rob Manfred’s efforts to restructure the game, he has forgotten perhaps the most important area in need of change. He refuses to enforce the strike zone.
“I just had some issue with the zone on a couple key pitches that I felt like were missed and I took exception to it and I guess he had heard enough,” Boone said, according the sportingnews.com.
All Boone really did was point out what everyone already knows: catchers try to cheat by framing pitches. Tiger’s catcher James McCann was definitely doing it. But don’t blame McCann, blame the system that basically rewards those who are better at it.
This has left the most critical influence to game outcomes at the discretion of moody and egotistical umpires who have forgotten that fans come to see the players, not the ones calling balls and strikes.
It’s killing the integrity of the game. Pete Rose got banned from Baseball for basically betting on himself. But when it comes to calling balls and strikes, umpires can do whatever they want.
Imagine it is game seven of the World Series. Masahiro Tanaka is scheduled to pitch for the Yankees. The night before the game the home plate umpire gets a call from a book-maker. Excuse me, I mean a sports investment financial advisor.
The conversation goes something like this:
“Hey, Mike. Tanaka’s on the mound tomorrow.”
“That’s right.”
“Well, we gotta skew the results. Here’s what we want you to do. All those sinker balls, don’t call any of them strikes. Make Tanaka get the ball up. His fastball isn’t what it use to be. So he’ll get rocked. There’s five million in it for you.”
Preposterous, you say? Well, there’s bad apples in every walk of life. If money is the root of all evil, what is to prevent an umpire from taking a chance at padding his pension?
Right now, nothing.
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