UPDATE: Surprise! No discipline at all for Phil Cuzzi. Graze a guy with a fastball or flip your bat in an impudent manner and you’re suspended and dined, but if you’re an umpire you can pick fights with players and make horrendous calls all you want, and baseball won’t touch you.
There is no accountability in umpiring today. This is a complete joke.
Monday, 4:17 P.M.: As I mentioned in the recaps this morning, Phil Cuzzi, the home plate umpire in yesterday’s Giants-Mets game made a monster screw up. In the bottom of the ninth, Travis Ishikawa came in with what should have been the game-winning run, but Cuzzi called him out, costing the Giants the win in regulation. Even Henry Blanco, who applied the late tag, admitted that Cuzzi blew the call.
Earlier that inning Cuzzi started jawing at Francisco Rodriguez when K-Rod took exception to a call. You can’t argue balls and strikes, but (a) K-Rod wasn’t arguing, he was merely sulking; and (b) there is no need for an ump to ever get all prickly and defensive like that. Toss the player if he goes over the line, but until then, the ump should ignore pouting players and maintain professional decorum.
Thankfully, it appears as though Major League Baseball is going to call Phil Cuzzi on the carpet. He could face a fine and -- if there is any justice in the world -- a suspension. Not only for his awful behavior and poor performance yesterday, but also for past umpire sins, most notably the foul ball call on what should have been a double off the bat of Joe Mauer in the Twins-Yankees ALDS last season.
Maybe that’s too much to ask. And yes, umpires make mistakes. But the aggressive confrontation of ballplayers we’ve seen from umpires this season is inexcusable, and Major League Baseball needs to nip it in the bud in a hurry.
