Another night, another botched call by the umpires.
The October to forget for the men in blue continued in Game 2 of the World Series when first base umpire Brian Gorman called the Phillies’ Chase Utley out on an eighth-inning-ending double play. Replays showed Utley was safe and the inning should have continued with runners on first and second against Mariano Rivera.
“On the replay it looked like there was a little bit of ball outside [Mark Teixeira’s] glove,” said Gorman. “It’s what we call a whacker.”
That means it was too tough to call by the naked eye, making it different than some of the other blown calls this postseason.
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Asked if it would bother him to have this one lumped with those, crew chief Jerry Davis said: “The answer is yes because [it was]very, very close.”
Utley did not protest the call at first and didn’t have much to say after the game. He asked reporters if they had seen the replay. When told it looked like he was safe he said, “Then there’s nothing else to say.
“It was one of those close plays,” Utley said. “I guess it could go either way. I haven’t seen the replay. If you say I was safe, then I guess I was safe.”
The Phillies had something going against Rivera in the inning. Trailing 3-1 Jimmy Rollins worked a one-out walk on 11 pitches. Shane Victorino then singled to right to bring Utley up with a chance to possibly tie or take the lead.
On the Fox broadcast, Tim McCarver questioned why Charlie Manuel did not have his runners in motion on the play, but the Phillies manager said Utley doesn’t hit into too many double plays.
“I’ll tell you something else: Utley was safe,” Manuel said. “Go look. Yeah, he was safe.”
On another controversial play, the umpires ruled Ryan Howard caught a line drive from Johnny Damon, then doubled up Jorge Posada running off first in the seventh. Replays showed the ball may have short-hopped into Howard’s glove. The umpires said they made the right call.
“The objective is to get it right, we asked each other what we had seen and the replay confirmed we got it right,” Davis said.