But that was my point. The umpire doesn't care if he jumps up and down, falls to the ground and writhes in pain. He calls what he sees or thinks he saw. The argument that he was obviously hit because he jumped around is flawed, that was the point of the video (not that Beltre was faking). Player reaction can be faked and it isn't always reliable. Hopping out of the box doesn't prove he was hit. The ball hitting his foot proves he was hit (again I am not arguing that he wasn't hit, he was). Unfortunately for the Rangers the umpire missed it, but human error is part of the game. The Rangers will most assuredly benefit from some similar call at some time in the future. It may not be in this Series or any World Series, but things like this always happen in baseball, at least until they get robot umpires. Here is another situation where faking getting hit didn't quite work out for a the batter although he gives a pretty convincing performance: <iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/26axJdDKYWw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> As for something completely different, but still game related. I was looking for some information and clicked on a yahoo article. I made the mistake of reading the comments. It seems there are a ton of misinformed fans out there that believe Berkman's hit should have been foul and not scored 2 runs. I have been laughing at some of the arguments about it hitting foul first so it shouldn't count. In fact there are more comments about that in their game article than on the obvious blown call on Beltre.
i egt your point but you keep showing replays of people getting "hit" by pitches and faking. It's completely different from the play being discussed. Like I said before...do you think that he thought "oh crap, it's a chopper to third, quick...act like the ball bounced off my foot and don't run to first". Hell, i don't even think he watched where the ball went. Given the situation and all the variables it just seemed like an obvious call.
Is there a reason that the Rangers' two best/hottest hitters are batting 6 and 7, while a hobbled Josh Hamilton is hitting #3, a relative scrub Elvis Andrus is at the #2 spot, and an OK-but-not-great Michael Young is at the #4 spot? I think the lineup should be: Kinsler Young Beltre/Cruz/Napoli in whatever order Hamilton Andrus (if he gets on, steal bases for the bottom of the order)
It's worked for them so far. But the reason I heard was that Cruz doesn't have the discipline to not chase after pitches outside the strike zone. If he's up with RISP and gets outs so that the next batter doesn't have the same chance to sacrifice a run in, it could cause problems. Other than that I don't know why they would do that.
I've been rooting for the Rangers since I moved here in '98...except when they play the Astros. Go Rangers..hope they win it now because when the 'Stros move into the AL West, I'll never root for the Rangers again.
I think my biggest problem is Hamilton hitting #3. When he's healthy, that's one thing. But he's not, and he's hitting like crap this postseason. It seems like you have 2 super-hot hitters - at the very least, swap one of those with him. If they don't trust Cruz, then Napoli is sitting there with a 1.000+ OPS and even better 2nd half of the season. Since the all star break, he's batting 0.380 with a 1.200 OPS, and he's batting 7!? It cost him an at-bat yesterday with him ending the game on the on-deck circle.
I would tend to agree with you, but I think Washington is probably one of those guys that will go more with their gut than what makes sense, and he probably figures it's worked so far, so why change it. I would definitely switch Napoli and Hamilton if it were me as well.
