Joe West Wants the Yank$ and $ox to Hurry Up!

[Mad Mark]

Even the umpires are getting sick and tired of the Yankee$ and Red $ox making time run backwards.

"It's pathetic and embarrassing. They take too long to play. ... I don't know what to tell you. I don't know what to do. I don't know how to make them pick up the pace. It's sad when school kids can't watch the end of the game because it ends too late."

.

[twoBshorty]

Oh, boy, this article made me angry. Hey, Joe, you wanna know how to speed up the games? Call strikes strikes and balls balls. Heck, call some balls strikes. Just don't, as your crew did repeatedly for this whole first series as evidenced by PitchFX, call strikes balls. Bigger strike zone equals quicker outs equals faster games. Stop allowing congressional hearings on the mound in the middle of innings, granting time willy-nilly, letting pitchers bake cookies between pitches, and giving enough time during pitching changes to relive the Ford administration. These are all things the umpire can control. Y'all are the umpires. Commercial breaks are also a big problem, but that probably comes from MLB and it makes money, so no change should be expected there.

My favorite quote:

They're two of the best teams in baseball. Why are they playing the slowest?

Um, the first sentence is the answer to the second. Better, more patient hitters, deeper counts, more runs scored, longer games. It doesn't account for all of it: the extraneous garbage mentioned above is a big part. But it's a factor. And let's not pretend like MLB doesn't want these games to go long. Yankees-Red Sox gets big ratings and longer games equals more ads.

[RShack]

Oh, boy, this article made me angry. Hey, Joe, you wanna know how to speed up the games? Call strikes strikes and balls balls. Heck, call some balls strikes. Just don't, as your crew did repeatedly for this whole first series as evidenced by PitchFX, call strikes balls. Bigger strike zone equals quicker outs equals faster games.

Good for you.

All they gotta do is call strikes according to what the rule book says the strike zone is. But they don't. There's no good reason why they don't, but they don't anyway. Plus, they each have their own version of it, which is nuts. If MLB would take umpiring seriously, and expect/demand that these guys simply and reliably call pitches based on the frigging rules, that would solve the dang time problem right there. Is anybody telling the umps to not go by the rules? If they went by the rules, would anybody raise hell about it? They could do it on their own if they wanted to. But they won't.

[Mad Mark]

Calling balls and strikes is hard, so I'll give a tiny bit of leeway there. But the rest of it is easy (you're already unpopular with the players, so there's no need to worry about that)...don't let the players dawdle out there.

[Moose Milligan]

Looks like West's comments definitely ruffled some feathers

http://sports.espn.go.com/boston/mlb/news/story?id=5071970

Thanks to Joe West for speaking his mind and telling how a good chunk of people who aren't Sox/Yanks fans feel.

Read some of the comments in the article I linked, it's kinda gross how self centered some of the Sox/Yanks are.

[Mad Mark]

Looks like West's comments definitely ruffled some feathers

http://sports.espn.go.com/boston/mlb/news/story?id=5071970

Thanks to Joe West for speaking his mind and telling how a good chunk of people who aren't Sox/Yanks fans feel.

Read some of the comments in the article I linked, it's kinda gross how self centered some of the Sox/Yanks are.

It's nice to see them falling into the predictable "how dare he criticize" and "with as much money as he makes" modes. What a bunch of maroons.

[PrivateO]

O's-Jays time of game yesterday: 2:56

Joe West: 1B ump.

Just saying.

[BaltimoreTerp]

O's-Jays time of game yesterday: 2:56

Joe West: 1B ump.

Just saying.

And that was with a 35-minute first inning

[twoBshorty]

Looks like West's comments definitely ruffled some feathers

http://sports.espn.go.com/boston/mlb/news/story?id=5071970

Thanks to Joe West for speaking his mind and telling how a good chunk of people who aren't Sox/Yanks fans feel.

Read some of the comments in the article I linked, it's kinda gross how self centered some of the Sox/Yanks are.

See, I don't think Joe West should be the one saying things like this. He's the umpire. A good umpire is neutral and doesn't make himself the story. Pedroia's comments were arrogant and entitled, but he'd talk the same way if you were arguing about the merits of skim vs. 1% milk, so it's better to just ignore him. And what else is arrogant and entitled? Whining about occasionally having to spend an extra 45 minutes doing your job when you already work less than half as many hours as most Americans for 3x the pay, you can't be bothered to get into any kind of physical shape to do your job, and you can blow calls left and right with no consequence.

I thought Francona's concerns about impartiality were valid, and I agreed with Mo Rivera's "If he has places to go, let him do something else." They really do need to shorten the games, but Joe West isn't the person to be shooting off about it.

[Mad Mark]

I almost wish West had made his comments about two different teams, so we could peel away the blather from buffoons who are mortally offended that anyone would dare criticize the sacrosanct Yankee$ and Red $ox.

There's gallons of bad blood between MLB (players and owners) and the umpires, which tends to color our reaction to every one of these stories. West isn't asking the players not to take pitches, he's asking them not to lollygag around all the damned time, and he's right!

OTOH, what I'd ask Joe (and every other umpire) to do is call the strike zone armpits to knees and at least some portion of the ball on or inside the black as the ball crosses the plate. That would have made our 30+ minute first inning yesterday go by in about 10 minutes. The called zone early yesterday was about the size of a postage stamp.

[russ snyder]

Joe west is way out of line for making these comments. One of my major issues with the umpires of today is their need to be seen and heard. They bait players into arguments at the drop of a hat. I find him and his comments extremely bush.