[QUOTE=PeteBooth;782210]
Quote:
IMO, you are missing the point. The MAIN reason Professionals and college umpires are NOT calling the neighborhood and the expected call is not because they do not want to or being an excellent umpire etc.
the reason is because of replay. Plain and Simple. a close play on ESPN is shown over and over and over again using a gazillion angles and Super Slo mo. Same with the college games that are on TV.
If this OP were posted "back in the day" the call would be out - PERIOD. You mean to tell me the PROS/D1 college umpires do not want outs if they can get them.
The neighborhood / expected call were around a LOOONG LOOONG time and it was the same for both teams. There used to be an old adage - When you are OUT you are OUT.
just because things change etc. doesn't necessarily translate into a better game.
In the play in question, F3 had his glove down, Plenty of time to get the runner. One of the reasons for the expected call was "why risk injury when there is no need to"
Since I am NOT on TV etc. I still subscribe to the "neighborhood" / phatom tag / expected call theories. I grew up with these calls and NO-ONE thought "twice" about it. We did not think that the umpires were cheating / had lack of Cijonies / etc. It was the way WE wanted the game to be called. It was the same for both teams so no-one had an unfair advantage over another.
Pete Booth
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Well said! I'm all for getting the call right, but there are excepted traditions in this game that are being changed based on what the average FAN wants to see. The changes in philosophy are not based on what baseball people want. If you were to poll 100 professional and 100 collegiate baseball players about the phantom DP, I would guess you'd find the vast majority of them are in favor of having it called the way it has been for years. They want to get out of the game with two primary goals acheived. They want a victory for their team, and they want to leave the field un-injured. Requiring a fielder to receive the ball right on top of the bag with a hard sliding runner bearing down on him is counter intuitive to one of those goals. The same can be said on a tag play where the ball beats the runner. There's no reason to require a fielder to leave his hand and arm exposed to being spiked while waiting for a runner to slide right into it.
Tim.