BFD, ripping Fox's production warranted, but 'they got it right', move on.

The camera and the subsequent ruling seemed to have cost the Phillies a run because even iuf the ball was headed out


no, there really is nothing to say after that except, maybe, it was hit By Alex the Roid-raged centaur and he should never be allowed to hit a home run, especially when playing for that team.

Otherwise, a home run ought to be called a home run because, you know, it's a home run.

That's got to be the most lame-ass excuse for a loss. "We lost because they called the guy's home run a home run, so we gave up another six runs in other innings." Cripes!

That's got to be the most lame-ass excuse for a loss. "We lost because they called the guy's home run a home run, so we gave up another six runs in other innings." Cripes!

Not even that, there were runs in the same inning following the homerun. So it's not a stretch to think that A-Rod would have scored from second and the runs behind him would have scored as well. Not guaranteed, but not unlikely.

EDIT: Gah, nevermind.

Something I just posted in the game chatter but on topic: Watching the Charlie Manuel interview from the press room ... He says, regarding the A-Rod home run, that the umpires told him they discussed the right-field camera issue before the game and said that if a ball hit that camera, then it was a home run. So maybe it wasn't matter of where and at what angle it hit the camera but rather if it hit the camera at all? If so, weren't the umps, in essence, making up a ground rule?

If so, weren't the umps, in essence, making up a ground rule?

Isn't that what umpires do when there is an obstruction (or whatever) on the field that isn't covered in the standard ground rules?

John Kruk is so mad right now. I'm siding with the camera on this one. :)

Jayson Werth has now hit 7 homers in 12 games this postseason which makes 43 including the regular season. In a related note, the Mets hit 95 the entire year.

Werth's ridiculous. I think both Victorino and Werth are FA's after 2010. Do the Phillies try to keep both, or just after one of them, or go full bore and play Taylor and Brown?

BFD, ripping Fox's production warranted, but 'they got it right', move on.

Did they? It was on a trajectory to hit the top of the fence, but I think it wasn't particularly obvious whether it would have bounced over or back onto the field. Certainly not clear enough to reverse the original call.

Coming into this postseason, Werth had a claim for the amorphous honor of being the most underrated player in baseball, so it's nice to see him get some national recognition. I just wish it weren't against the team I root for!

Did they? It was on a trajectory to hit the top of the fence, but I think it wasn't particularly obvious whether it would have bounced over or back onto the field. Certainly not clear enough to reverse the original call.

This was not fan interference; this was under the groundrules. What "would have happened" doesn't matter; hitting the camera is a homerun. That should have been communicated to the managers (or whomever took cards to the umps). Whether it was or wasn't, deciding hitting the camera would be a homerun is completely what would be the expected groundruling, in such a case.

Any thoughts on Teixeira's effing "fourth ball" just before the A-Rod homer? That was the bigger joke. The d-bag should have been rung up, and it changed the whole inning. Lackey would've had another coronary. Watching NY is like watching Duke--

Werth had a claim for the amorphous honor of being the most underrated player in baseball, so it's nice to see him get some national recognition.

The dreaded Joe Rudi under/overrated swell about to begin!

Did they? It was on a trajectory to hit the top of the fence, but I think it wasn't particularly obvious whether it would have bounced over or back onto the field.

Waaaah, waaah, waaaaah.

Any thoughts on Teixeira's effing "fourth ball" just before the A-Rod homer? That was the bigger joke.

Waaaah, waaah, waaaaah.

I think it was a strike, but I'd guess a pitch right there is called a ball about 50% of the time.

To me, it looked like the ball would have cleared the wall based on the trajectory. It was a home run any way you look at it. Ground rule or not.

Getting to the topic that maters more. Why wound they put a camera there in the first place? Can any ballpark grow a brain and build a 3' buffer at the fence like Cleveland so this ######## doesn't happen? Its seriously not that hard.

It was probably a HR, but got muddied by FOX and their need for a camera at EVERY angle. No matter how useless.

Should have been a solo shot - agree. I said my stuff on this in chatter - I'm done.

All the Phillies fans in the bar where I watched it agreed with me that it was a home run.

Yeah, the issue isn't whether the umps blew the call, they didn't. The issue is why Fox had to make themselves the story, instead of the game. If the umps noticed it before hand, why wasn't the camera moved before the game? Was the possible integrity of the game less important than inconveniencing the broadcaster which had messed up? I imagine there is some rule for how much space the cameraman has to have exclusive of the camera - and some genius ordered the wrong camera to be brought, longer than the space allowed. But the first priority should be not to intrude into the actual game.

man, and people complain about Yankee Stadium giving up too many homers

Also they never actually showed that camera's view of the home run. Which makes me think it wasn't in use. Which is even dumber.

Also they never actually showed that camera's view of the home run. Which makes me think it wasn't in use. Which is even dumber.

They actually did show it. You could barely tell when the ball hit it.

That's not true, Fox did show the camera's view of the homer. The ball hit the top of the camera, causing the view to shake. Didn't add anything to the broadcast, but they did show it.

Weird, I thought I was paying close attention. But I was also talking to Jon Benet Ramsey from south Philly.

The weirdest part of the whole thing is that the camera's name is Jeffrey Maier.

John Kruk is so mad right now. I'm siding with the camera on this one. :)

The camera adds 10 pounds. Kruk adds 80.

It's official...FOX has now ruined baseball completely. Carry on.

He actually puts this at the end of his post, with of course no further comment on his previous shrill hysteria. Kind of sums up what I hate about instantaneous "commentary" on the internet.

UPDATE: The hit was ruled a home run because the ground rules had been agreed upon prior to the game and they said if a ball hit a camera it would be a homer.

The issue is why Fox had to make themselves the story, instead of the game. If the umps noticed it before hand, why wasn't the camera moved before the game?

Come on. This is ########, knee jerk "I hate fox" regardless reaction. They weren't trying to make themselves the story, they were trying to give you access to the best camera angels they could, to make your viewing experience the best they could.

Whop-de-do. It hit the camera, a camera which by rule if it hit was a homer. This is so a ####### non-story.

"The weirdest part of the whole thing is that the camera's name is Jeffrey Maier."

I'd get a Coke if this was the live chatter for this game. I assume Coke-age doesn't travel, though, correct?

Getting to the topic that maters more. Why wound they put a camera there in the first place? Can any ballpark grow a brain and build a 3' buffer at the fence like Cleveland so this ######## doesn't happen? Its seriously not that hard.

This is the important general point. Instead of using instant replay why don't they construct the stadiums so that this isn't necessary. That said the ground rule is a reasonable response. However if this was the agreed upon groundrule why didn't Buck and McCarver know this. Isn't it their job to know this kind of thing?

Whop-de-do. It hit the camera, a camera which by rule if it hit was a homer. This is so a ####### non-story.

But you KNOW that if it'd been Victorino instead of A-Rod, Selig would have ordered the umpires to rule it "camera interference" and called it an out. This was decided in 1984, at a meeting of the Trilateral Commission that was held at Stalin's birthplace in Kenya.

However if this was the agreed upon groundrule why didn't Buck and McCarver know this. Isn't it their job to know this kind of thing?

No, it's their job to promote FOX's fall lineup, and football schedule for Sunday.

Here's an article talking about the ground rule established before the game.

I agree that now that we know that hitting the camera at all is a home run, it's a non-story.

From the MLB link...

"We tour the field during the series whenever we go to a new ballpark, and discuss specific ground rules and potential trouble areas just like that," Davis said. "Because we cannot control what the cameraman does with the camera, one of the specific ground rules is when the ball hits the camera, [it's a] home run."

But they can control what a fan does with his hands?

I can barely control what I do with my hands.

However if this was the agreed upon groundrule why didn't Buck and McCarver know this. Isn't it their job to know this kind of thing?

nope--it's the baseball equivalent of the tuck rule

Werth's ridiculous. I think both Victorino and Werth are FA's after 2010. Do the Phillies try to keep both, or just after one of them, or go full bore and play Taylor and Brown?

Can either Brown or Taylor stick in center? I'd let Victorino go, lock up Werth, and have one of the kids take over center, and the other one take over left a year later for Ibanez. Or sooner if Raul plays more like he did in the 2nd half than the first.

Werth is that rare tools player that didn't get a real chance to play everyday until he was 29. Injuries hurt his progress, as did a bad 2005 season with the Dodgers. Both the Orioles and Blue Jays gave him up for middle relievers, and the Dodgers thought so little of him that they let him go as soon as he was eligible for arbitration.

Kudos to the Phillies for taking a low cost flyer on him when every other team had a chance to sign him. He exposes teams that pay lip service to "scouting information" above the numbers in player evaluations. I don't see how a scout misses the fact that he can hit for power, run well, throw well, and show patience at the plate. He signed in the same offseason as guys like Carlos Lee, Soriano, Drew, Pierre, and Gary Matthews Jr. got their millions.

If you paid no attention to the numbers, only ability and recognizing the impact of aging curves, Werth should have been considered right there with the others. MLB teams don't actually pay attention to that type of evaluation. They just pay you based on numbers. Some teams pay on the dumb numbers (Carlos Lee, RBI), and some by the smart numbers (Drew, OBP, defense), but there's a real opportunity for teams that can find a guy with ridiculous ability who just hasn't, for whatever reason, put up the numbers yet.

I don't think I agree with "Toolsy players who haven't put it together yet are underappreciated in baseball" as a general rule. I think that people like Werth get lots of chances. Just to name a few, Daniel Cabrera and Corey Patterson continue to get chances. Jeremy Reed is still around. It's true that the "We're not selling jeans here" attitude is pervasive, but I don't think lumpy types are actually getting advantages over non-hitting track stars.

I'm not trying to make a case for a general rule about toolsy players. But Jason Werth has so much talent, that I look at him and wonder why more teams weren't trying to get him. Daniel Cabrera is actually out of tools. He doesn't even throw hard anymore. I don't know why anybody gives him major league chances.

I'm not trying to make a case for a general rule about toolsy players.

Really? You should beat up that joker who got your username and password, then:

there's a real opportunity for teams that can find a guy with ridiculous ability who just hasn't, for whatever reason, put up the numbers yet.

Look, I completely agree about Werth. Good for the Phils for seeing things that no one else apparently saw.

You used the examples of Corey Patterson and Daniel Cabrera. Doesn't really fit. Cabrera is out of tools, and has been for a few years. Patterson has great speed, but his all-around game was pretty limited once it became apparent that some of the power he showed as a young player was unsustainable. Nelson Cruz is a similar multi-talented player who got his chance this year. If I spent a few hours I could probably identify a few more. Rocco Baldelli immediately comes to mind. A team would have to think there's reason his injury/illness problems could be overcome, but it would not surprise me if he had a .300, 25 homer season in him, is a good defender, and signed for peanuts last year. I see he spent two stints on the DL this year, but the main reason for his getting only 150 AB was that he wasn't an everyday player.

I don't see how a scout misses the fact that he can hit for power, run well, throw well, and show patience at the plate.

Because this is...########. The problem with scouting position players is that they can run like the wind, throw a ping-pong ball through a steel door, and show prodigious power and patience...

...and still, never hit, because the ability to make solid contact at the big league level is a capricious, difficult to recognize talent. Therefore the only way to really identify it is to look at numbers, because to the naked eye the guy who will hit 300 and the guy who will K 170 times and hit 250 are basically impossible to tell apart.

Werth looked like a guy who couldnt make contact with big-league pitching. He had a ####-ton of strikeouts before his injury, and unless he ended up with SERIOUS power, like 30HR type power (which his record suggested was theoretically possible, but unlikely), he was never going to hit for enough average to be a big league regular, even with plus defense in the corner and plus baserunning.

Werth put it together and developed enough power to carry his strikeouts. But, that's just a freak thing. For every Werth, there are 5 guys who hit .250/310/410 and come off the bench for a few years before fading to obscurity. That's what any rational observer would have thought was the most likely outcome for Werth, even with his "tools", even before his injury.

Your preening would be more impressive to me if you could name a few players now who are going to go "Werth" on the league in the next couple of seasons. Can't do it, can ya?

Werth put it together and developed enough power to carry his strikeouts. But, that's just a freak thing. For every Werth, there are 5 guys who hit .250/310/410 and come off the bench for a few years before fading to obscurity. That's what any r
Don't forget that the Phils signed Werth as a 4th OF. Even after "outperforming" 4th OF expectations, he was seen as a platoon OF -- remember that the Phils signed Jenkins in 2008. The Phils under Gillick and Amaro have been steady in bringing in useful bits, in the case of Werth and Victorino, they've been good and lucky.

No, it's their job to promote FOX's fall lineup, and football schedule for Sunday.

Speaking of such things, they ran this completely ridiculous, ludicrous World Series-Avatar tie-in to open last night's game...then, when it finally came time to show live footage, the first thing they showed were Ozzie et al, sitting around, saying NOTHING, while a fourth guy talked off-camera.

I mean, these people have jobs? You have the whole long, epicly tenuous montage to set up, and you can't even switch to the right camera?