ron gant stalling and hirschbeck dale seer stephenson writes while i can see why they want to cut down on the time spent walking around gant wasn t ordered back in the box sooner he was ordered back immediately as soon as he stepped out hirschbeck told him to get back in the box now gant doesn t take a lot of walks between pitches the only reason he did then because he was very bothered by the call i expect his concentration wasn t there yet and in a crucial situation i imagine it s best to be as calm as possible contributing factors would be gant s bad day at the plate bad year at the plate and the braves long scoring drought and it is not hirschbeck s job to help gant with any of these difficulties if gant can t gather his concentration for whatever reason that just makes him all the more meat in the batter s box the umpire s job is to maintain flow of play gant is not entitled to time to regather his faculties nor is anyone else now it s pretty stupid to go ahead and talk the walk when the umpire is telling you to get in there you know the umpire is going to do something call for a strike throw you out etc gant was wrong absolutely i think it d be more accurate to say gant was foolish but hirschbeck was more wrong in my biased view aside from the major chip he seemed to have on his shoulder what was the problem gant had a reason to want some time disputed strike call if a disputed strike call is ample reason for a timeout games would last about nine fifteen weeks if jack morris or dave whiner stieb were pitching a disputed strike call is not sufficient for a time out suck it up get back in the box and never badmouth the blue they re not going to change their mind and you re just going to come across as a pinhead which won t help you with the borderline calls ftr i never speak to umpires when i don t know them personally nor do i glance at them or react to calls as a result i think i get more than my fair share of borderline calls at the plate because i have a rep of having a good eye actually there are a lot of negative connotations that go with that rep including copious questions about my masculinity party affiliation and sexual preference gant hadn t been wasting time all game the game had been cruising along and was just over two hours old irrelevant he was wasting time then the score was with outs in the ninth and a runner in scoring position is there any reason hirschbeck couldn t and shouldn t cut gant a little slack because it s not his job because setting the precedent of cutting slack there can easily extend to those hour games kind of like the phantom dp for no discernible constructive reason hirschbeck disrupted the game caused a five minute delay and materially hurt the batter in a key situation did he have a date to get to gant hurt himself and the braves disrupted the game your biases are exposed and i m sitting here defending umpires and the sf giants which is like phyllis schlafly defending gary segura jack kevorkian and the swedish abortion team and i still wonder why terry was tossed earlier in the game i believe terry said the magic word there are some truly quick ways to get tossed from a ballgame for a primer email me good ways to get tossed from a game ask ken kaiser if he got his money back from nutri system kiss rich garcia on the lips and say hi honey i m home goose eric gregg ask bruce froemming if his parents had any children that lived get naked source the greg spira book of diamond ettiquette as told to peter gammons collier press gary huckabay outside that was right down the bleedin pipe balder than any kenny i realize i don t have great control but dave on the net c mon gary that was a styrofoam cup the really plate s a foot to your right throw the ball
