I saw an ump grant a 3-pitch walk the other night. I can't remember what game it was. It's probably a bad sign that such mistakes from umpires don't even seem noteworthy.

What did that look like on game center?

I saw an ump grant a 3-pitch walk the other night. I can't remember what game it was.

Really? I think we would have heard about that.

What's really sad is that having watched the Rays/Sox game on Sunday, this 5-ball walk wasn't even close to the worst display of umpiring I'd seen.

Did anybody complain after the fourth ball? I wish this account weren't so vague.

Ha. I was watching the game, and I saw above the score display Ethier's stats with a full count. Then a ball was thrown, and Ethier took a step away from the plate, Miller was going to say something, and ... nothing.

I don't think Miller/Morgan questioned it.

Big deal. John Kruk could draw a walk with only one ball.

I tuned in right after the inning with the 5-ball walk. After they figured out that it had indeed been 5 balls, they showed a replay of a closeup of Blanton's face, after he threw ball 4 and Ethier didn't go to first, yelling "What's the count?" and then looking really confused. But he didn't say anything of course.

BTW, everyone should be watching the game, it's 2-2 in the tenth. Blownsave by Broxton.

Helluvan escape by Durbin, too. Bases loaded, nobody out, and he works out of it.

Great Phillies moment at the beginning of the bottom of the 10th...it was basically "The Phillies have their three sluggers up...and two of them are left-handed, so the Dodgers have lefty Joe Beimel pitching...and between Utley and Howard, on deck is Pat Burrell. Oh wait, no, it's So Taguchi." Jon Miller didn't remember that Taguchi had been brought in, presumably because he thought it would be extremely illogical for Taguchi to be brought in and therefore cognitive dissonance blocked it from his memory.

(ROLLS EYES)

This time the 39-year-old, non-fast Taguchi was brought in as a pinch-runner for Burrell instead of the usual pattern in which he's brought in as a replacement left fielder for Burrell in the seventh.

BLARG

Just like in those stats Dial posted a month ago, Ryan Howard's gold glove-quality defense is cancelled out by his offensive ineptitude. Picked off after an intentional walk?

Gary Thorne and Dave Campbell, on radio, did say something about the count being 3-2 when Ethier received what Layne ruled to be ball 3.

-- MWE

They won't fire Torre, but the Dodgers are sure underperforming relative to what the media out there probably expects them to be doing.

They're only about a game worse than their run differential, but it's their run differential that seems like it ought to be a lot higher.

Well that was an exciting game. I knew signing Pedro Feliz would be the best move imaginable. Did pinch-runner Kyle Kendrick score one of the winning runs, or was that the other inning? I have to go to bed, can't remember.

So, the Phillies looked Nationalsesque in being swept in a 4-game series by the Dodgers less than two weeks ago. Now they have a chance to sweep the Dodgers in a 4-game series. Youneverknow.

I saw an ump grant a 3-pitch walk the other night. I can't remember what game it was.

Really? I think we would have heard about that.

It was the Red Sox versus the Orioles, with Coco Crisp being the beneficiary.

And bitter old me thinks that you didn't hear about it because the national media doesn't care if the O's get screwed in favor of the Sox.

Unforgiveable.

Is this on the list of things replay can correct? And is it possible we're going to get a lot of this possibly Luddite behavior from the umpires?

yes, as wickedwitch said, Coco Crisp was given a 3-ball walk vs. the O's a week or so ago. Or rather it appeared to be a 3-ball walk. The graphic on MASN had the count 2-2 before the pitch, and apparently the ballpark scoreboard did too, but Crisp started to walk to first immediately after the fifth pitch was called a ball. No one objected -- the O's manager did come out and talk briefly with the ump, but not in any sort of agitated way. At the beginning of the next half-inning, the MASN announcers replayed the sequence and confirmed that yes, there were only five pitches thrown, Crisp had fouled off one of them. There was another pitch that had been counted as a strike on the MASN graphic (and on the ballpark scoreboard) but apparently it was not called a strike on the field. In short, the count really was 3-1 after four pitches. That's the story, at least.

You didn't hear about it because the Orioles inquired and accepted that it wasn't truly a 3-ball walk.

is it possible we're going to get a lot of this possibly Luddite behavior from the umpires?

Losing track of the count is Luddite behavior? Screwing up on purpose, thus calling attention to yourself and raising questions about your competence, is a deliberate strategy of protest? Try the decaf, dude.