Maybe I missed something. Were there crocs lurking in those standing puddles? Was the rain turning the infield mud into quicksand? Was it acid rain?
I'm not saying the game shouldn't have been suspended or delayed. Quite the contrary.
I think Bud Selig handled the situation exactly right (ugh, just threw up a little in my mouth). The infield had become modern baseball's version of unplayable and the driving rain couldn't have made hitting, throwing, or catching very easy.
Just seeing the ball was probably pretty challenging. With the game tied and Cole Hamels nearing the end of his rope (Rays' starter Scott Kazmir had already departed), there was no reason to continue playing.
For that matter, I think Selig has handled the preset-postseason schedule admirably.
Of course, I'm on the West Coast so this is probably a little unfair, but I had no problem with the late start to Game Three. The game was scheduled for that day, the fans paid and planned to see the game that day, and the television schedules planned for the game to air that night. It was far from ideal, but so would have been the solution.
What, postpone the game? Jumble the fans' lives and the television schedules to accommodate that? And what happens if the weather doesn't clear up? I've never lived in Philadelphia, never been there. But I don't imagine late-October/early-November is a particularly warm and sunny season.
This is the Northeast we're talking about. In late autumn. Not a wonderful time to be waiting for several hours of clear weather.
You're telling me people wouldn't be whining if that scenario had unfolded? Bull excrement.
As for all this nonsense about suspending the game earlier, give me a freakin' break. Once again, you're telling me the Ken Rosenthals of the world wouldn't be taking to cyberspace with equal zeal, writing about how much of a disadvantage it is to cut Hamels off so early and deprive the Phils of his full services? Or to force the Rays to dwell on a deficit for hours, maybe days? Or something else?
But my favorite nasal utterance is how unfair it was to allow the Rays the "advantage" of hitting in the top half of the sixth without allowing Philadelphia that luxury in the bottom half.
Sure, there were standing puddles in the infield and around home plate. But most of those puddles were in the base paths. Am I the only one who saw B.J. Upton barely score from second on a two-out base hit? The man can fly and was off with contact, but Pat Burrell almost threw him out.
Yes, Burrell's throw hit a puddle and he couldn't charge the ball with the same vigor due to the slick surface. But Upton faced his own obstacles; look how gingerly he rounded third or how slow his normally lightning-quick break was. Not to mention that Burrell was able to play much more shallowly due to the elements. Or how about the fact that both Upton and Carlos Pena had to see a Cole Hamels pitch well enough to make solid contact through a driving rain?
The point is the elements made the game conditions difficult for both teams. Joe Buck and Tim McCarver correctly pointed out that the sloppy field actually might have been more damaging to Tampa Bay because speed is such an important weapon for them.
The only thing that compromises the integrity of competition is an unfair advantage that one team possess over the other. Weather, even weather as bad as last night's, simply does not qualify because both teams must deal with it. It hinders performance to be sure, but that is not compromising the integrity in any negative sense of the phrase.
Hitting. Fielding. Throwing. Pitching. Running. Seeing.
These are the things that are harder to do in the rain and they must be done by both teams. Perhaps it disfavors a team that relies more heavily on speed than others. MAYBE. But that would be the Rays in this scenario so the issue is moot.
The point is, if you tell the whole story (as usual), there really is no controversy.
The conspiracy-for-dollars guys out there will tell you the rainy top of the sixth was an advantage for the Rays because they tied the game. That shouldn't surprise anyone. They'd be telling you it was an advantage for the Phillies if it had ended in their favor.
Controversy increases media revenue and is easy to create if you have a platform from which to tell one side of the story.
And that goes for the poor umpires as well. I take little pleasure in writing that sentence.
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