Yu Darvish has played in the MLB for 3 seasons. In those 3 seasons he has now twice carried a no hitter right down to the final out of the 9th inning and lost it. The most recent of those 2 almost no hitters occurred Friday night against the Red Sox. But this one was different.
As good as Darvish was striking out 12 batters and maintaining control through a gargantuan workload of 126 pitches, many believe that the no hit bid should not have lasted to the 9th inning. In the court of public opinion, the no hit bid should have ended with Darvish's perfect game bid; in the 7th inning when a botched play on an Ortiz fly ball was ruled an error rather than a hit.
At that point, Darvish was on fire as he had mowed down each of the first 20 Red Sox who came to the plate. To that point he had kept his pitch count low and had logged 10 strikeouts and was pitching one of the best games of his career. To those watching this game, the play of Darvish did not look like some lucky fluke. This was a guy who knew what he was doing. He was playing the right mind games, making the right pitches and simply harnessing that little bit intangible magic that a pitcher needs to be as close to perfect as it takes to hurl a perfect game or no hitter. But then David Ortiz came to the plate and reminded the baseball world that he is ALWAYS ready to hit the baseball.
With 2 outs and a favorable 3-1 count to the Red Sox DH, Darvish left a 93 MPH fastball over the middle of the plate. Though Ortiz did not hit the ball perfectly, he got some serious air under it and lofted a high fly ball out into shallow right centerfield. After right feilder, Alex Rios, called off 2nd basemen, Rougned Odor, he failed to actually pursue the ball. Odor noticed this at the last moment and upon doing so launched himself towards the falling ball. He failed to catch it though meaning that right then and there the perfect game was gone. But what was still up in the air was a debate as to whether or not the play would be ruled an error or a hit. If it was ruled an error than Darvish would still have a no hitter going. If it was not ruled an error than David Ortiz would be given a hit and Darvish would likely have left the game with a far less prestigious 7 to 8 inning 1 hit outing.
So who was to make this weighted decision? According to MLB regulations that role would be filled by the official scorer of the game. In this case that was Steve Weller who was watching the play from the scorers booth behind home plate. In his time of confusion he went to the MLB rule book where he reread rule 10.12a1. It states that "a fly ball that lands -- that's allowed to hit the ground, that in the judgment of the official scorer under normal effort could be caught -- you're to award an error on the play."
Weller decided that either Rios or Odor should have made the catch and so he ruled an error on the play. But it took a while. For over a minute, fans watched the scoreboard while Weller said he actually called the Elias Sports Bureau to get their opinion on the call. He said they concurred with his judgment and so he punched the play in as an error.
"My feeling was Rios called him off and he made a last-ditch effort. I felt Rios had an easier play coming in,''
Even Rios did not necessarily agree with the call. He said that he had once experienced a very similar play that had been ruled a hit and fully expected this one to be no different.
David Ortiz was more decisive in his judgment of the call.
"I know I hit a ball that was supposed to be caught," Ortiz said. "The guy is throwing a no-hitter. We all understand, but when it comes down to the rules of the game, that's a hit. That's the rule that we all know and that's the rules that the game had for more than 100 years."
He also said he did not care that the play could have broken up the no hitter. He just wanted to be credited with a hit.
"They have to [overturn the ruling], otherwise they are going to have to fix some s--- up. I wouldn't have minded if the guy was throwing a no-hitter. I wouldn't have minded, to be honest with you."
You see David Ortiz has something going with that comment. It should not matter that the play broke up a no hitter. Furthermore, there is even a case to be made that a team should not supply the official scorer simply because of the fact that in baseball you "root, root, root for the home team". I would not go so far to accuse Steve Weller of giving into home town bias but I definitely think that he allowed the magnitude of the play to influence his decision.
Lucky for Weller though, the no hitter was eventually broken up by Ortiz with 2 outs in the 9th and he is not facing nearly as much scrutiny as he would be if Darvish was able to finish off the no-no.
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