Rockies/Padres tonight at 7:30...

[sangell2007]

Ryan Howard + Matt Holliday + Citizen's Bank Park + Coors Field + JORGE JULIO + pretty much the entire Phillies bullpen = 5 games of 14-12 goodness.

[longflyball]

Ryan Howard + Matt Holliday + Citizen's Bank Park + Coors Field + JORGE JULIO + pretty much the entire Phillies bullpen = 5 games of 14-12 goodness.

Ech. No thanks. Playoff games take forever as it is. I'll take 5-3 games that are decided late.

[RShack]

I saw this opinion posted on officiating.com, and I think this guy has a good idea what was going on in the ump's mind:

"I have to admit that I'm a bit skeptical. I think there's at least a chance that he didn't see it, knew he didn't have it, wanted the runner to touch to make it irrelevant, but once the catcher had the ball and the runner didn't move, made the expected, not unexpected call. Maybe he was replaying it in his head and waiting to be sure of his call. Seemed a bit late, though."

I agree that I think the ump was waiting for Holliday to go back and touch the plate, but since he wasn't moving and the catcher was coming in for the kill, he'd look really silly if he signaled safe any later.

So, he was judging whether Holliday missed the plate or not by seeing if the guy scrambled to get back and touch the plate?

I think the ump's behavior would make sense only if there was a 3-second rule: "when the runner misses the plate, the C has 3 seconds to tag him, or else he's safe"... and the ump went "one Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi" and called him safe because the C hadn't tagged him yet...

[sangell2007]

Tim McClelland has been that deliberate for as long as I've known who Tim McClelland was. It honestly wouldn't surprise me if that was just his normal safe call. It may infuriate some people and he may have been wrong but I think all these people saying that he went about that completely the wrong way just don't know the way he calls a game.