I love baseball. I didn't love it recently while watching the Atlanta Braves-St. Louis Cardinals first-time sudden-death playoff game.
The call the umpires made of a fly ball to left field very well could have been the game changer with St. Louis ahead and Atlanta at bat, not to mention the poor judgment of the Atlanta shortstop and left fielder.
This late and aberrant call might have been buried and forgotten had it happened in August, but in October--in the National League sudden-death playoffs of the two wild card teams--it was inexcusable. The infield fly rule, my word!--such an expansion of the infield and the rule.
Understandably, the crowd was mightily displeased throwing all kinds of illegally imported soft and hard drink bottles onto the field for almost 20 minutes after the unforgettable play.
That the players showed their nervous, unsettled play for this first-ever one-game showdown was somewhat understandable, but the Atlanta fans with their disconcerting loud and continuous chant--something from cowboy-and-Indian movies--displayed the unsettled nature of what I would call a "bad" call by Major League Baseball management.
I say discontinue the one-game sudden-death playoff after teams have shown what they can deliver after 162 games of regular season.
George Beddoe
Fredericksburg