On April 7th, 2012, I went to a Detroit Tigers baseball game at Comerica Park with my parents and my two younger brothers, ages 15 and 12. It was the second game of the season for the Tigers, who were playing against the Boston Red Sox, and we were sitting in upper-level seats along the right field foul line. In the fifth inning, Detroit’s third baseman, Miguel Cabrera hit a pitch deep into left-center field that, at first, was ruled an automatic double because it looked as though the ball had rolled under the fence. Cabrera, however, kept running as though it was a homerun until one of his teammates told him that is was only a double. Looking for an explanation, the Tigers’ manager, Jim Leyland, jogged over to the umpire that had made the ruling on the play. After a somewhat lengthy conversation with Leyland, the umpire, C.B. Bucknor, had a brief meeting with the other three umpires, and then they all proceeded to go into the replay room behind home plate in order to review the play. About two minutes later, the umpires emerged from the room and ruled that the play was a homerun, giving Cabrera his second of the game. This was a perfect example of how unpredictable the game of baseball can be. I learned about instant replay in Major League Baseball when it was first used, late in the 2008 season. There had been a lot of discussion about it on local and national baseball telecasts, due to its highly-anticipated arrival in the sport. The baseball community was undecided as a whole on whether or not it should be allowed. Those against it argued that the beauty of the sport was the fact that it allowed for human error, unlike hockey, football and basketball which all used instant replay during games to help make correct calls on questionable plays. People that favored instant replay pointed to the fact that a lot of potential homeruns were incorrectly ruled as automatic doubles or singles, dramatically changing the outcomes of many games. When it did arrive in the MLB, instant replay was only allowed to be used by umpires if they decided that they could not conclude if a homerun had been hit. Through the Tigers’ television broadcasts, I learned that replay could only be used to determine whether a fly ball with enough distance was fair (a homerun) or foul (not a homerun), if the ball had actually left the playing field, or whether or not a potential homerun was interfered with by a spectator (not a homerun). The rule also stated that only an umpire can decide to review a call, and that a manager cannot force one to. Although this was only the first step towards full-scale instant replay, it has been highly successful. Often times, when a manager runs out of the dugout, he is doing so to aggressively argue with an umpire over a questionable call, usually resulting in the manager being ejected from the game. I could tell that this was not what Leyland had in mind. Instead of getting red in the face and yelling at the umpire, I believe he calmly asked Bucknor for an explanation and walked back to his spot on the bench. The reason that I believe this is because Leyland is currently serving in his seventh season as the manager of the Tigers, and I’ve learned how he reacts in certain situations by watching him and by reading about him in various articles. He never gets upset over a call where one of his players is not called out, he only gets curious about reasoning on questionable decisions, and he does not have a short temper. He does become upset when his team is not winning, when an umpire blatantly makes a bad call on one of his players, and when the media asks him uneducated questions about why a specific batting order was used. Leyland is not the most upbeat guy in the world, but at 68 years old, I’ve learned through analyzing polls, that he is universally respected in the baseball world for his immense knowledge and serious demeanor.

While I don’t know much about umpires individually, I do know that they have one of the toughest jobs in all of sports. There’ve been times when I’ve actually felt bad for an umpire as he is being screamed at by an angry manager because of an alleged bad call. I’ve watched tons of times where a batter becomes displeased with an umpire because he called a strike in a bad location. I’ve also watched pitchers protest when an umpire calls a ball where a strike should’ve been called. If an umpire ejects somebody from a game because they were protesting a call, they get screamed at even more, although it is not beneficial for players or managers to empty their lungs into someone’s face just because they made a mistake. In 2010, Tigers pitcher Armando Galarraga was one out away from finishing a perfect game, where the opposing team has no base runners for an entire game. A routine groundball was hit to Cabrera, the first baseman at the time, and he picked it up and tossed it to Galarraga at first base for what would’ve been the final out. Umpire Jim Joyce ruled that the runner was safe, even though replays clearly showed that he wasn’t. After the game, I watched as the cameras followed Joyce into the Tigers’ clubhouse where he tearfully apologized for ruining what should’ve been a perfect game. The national media disregarded the apology and zeroed in on the missed call, and Tigers fans all but banished Joyce from the ballpark. My point is that no umpire should be treated this way, because humans are supposed to make mistakes and that’s what makes the game so pure. As much criticism as they receive, umpires do a great job of enforcing the rules of the game, which is how I’ve learned most of them and why I’m able to understand the events that happen on the field. Back at Comerica Park last April, I was sort of curious as to what happened that caused the ruling on Cabrera’s hit to be changed from a double to a homerun. I watched as Leyland talked to Bucknor in a calm manner, which told me that he was not mad at him but simply curious. I’m assuming that is why Bucknor decided to converge with his fellow umpires to ask them if they thought a mistake had been made and that is why they decided to use their most modern tool, instant replay, to determine the fate of the hit. When they did look at the replay, which I checked out when I got home that day, they saw that the ball had cleared the fence and hit the bullpen dugout on the other side, causing it to appear as though the ball had actually landed in a gap in between two sections of the fence and trickled under it. Once they saw the replay they knew for sure that the ball had left the field of play and therefore was considered a homerun. The umpires deserve a lot of credit for reviewing this play because they could’ve just as easily decided not to. If Leyland had stormed onto the field and yelled at the umpires, they probably would’ve ejected him and Cabrera would most likely have one less homerun added to his impressive statistics. I’ve always claimed that there are things that I have yet to see when it comes to baseball, but the things that I have seen have taught me a lot about America’s pastime. I’ve learned that if a manager keeps calm, the umpires will have more respect for him, and that baseball is open to changes such as instant replay. Through watching the broadcasts, I’ve learned how to analyze rules and how they are applied in game situations. I know that the media has a way of taking one bad call and making it seem like the ugliest thing they’ve ever seen. Most importantly, I can now interpret everything that happens on the baseball diamond, and can have a respect unlike anything else for this wonderful sport.