Mike Dougherty's Blog

Nobody noticed or was it just too late?

When Philadelphia hitter Chase Utley was ruled safe at first in the ninth inning of Phillies-Rockies frigid NLDS game in Denver early Monday (CT), the ump making the sign that first baseman Todd Helton was pulled off the bag by pitcher Huston Street’s throw, TBS announcers Brian Anderson and Joe Simpson barely mentioned that it appeared that the ball may have hit Utley in the batter’s box.

If it did hit him, the ball should have been ruled foul.

They never mentioned that Utley ran down the edge of the grass along the baseline, never entering the area marked as a runner’s lane until he got to first base. If his running outside the lane prevented Street from making a good throw, the umpire could have called him out.

Utley moved the runner ahead of him to third, thus allowing him to score on the fly ball by the next hitter up, Ryan Howard. That turned out to be the go-ahead and eventual winning run.

I don’t know if either was the case, but the announcers should have done more “investigating” with replays than they did. It may have meant the difference in the game.

In either case, the TBS announcers seemed to have the attitude of “it’s late, let’s not make too much of a fuss about it.” Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe they just didn’t pay attention.