By Rob Ficiur

On Sunday May 30, 2010 former Blue Jay ace pitched his first no-hitter.  It wasn’t just a no-hitter – it was a perfect game.  Halladay put out all 27 batters he faced.  In the history of major league baseball the Doc’s performance was only the 20th perfect game.
Two days later the news moved on looking for more stories.  On Thursday the 21st perfect game in Major League history was thrown.  However, unlike the Halladay game, this Imperfect Perfect Game is something fans will remember for a while.
Detroit pitcher Armando Galarraga had got 26 batters in a row out.  With two outs in the ninth inning, Armando was one out away from a perfect game.  A routine ground ball was grabbed by the short stop…tossed to first base he was … safe?  Umpire Jim Joyce called the runner safe…
Perfect games and no hitters are often lost on that last out.  Roy Halladay had seen it happen to him before.  While it would be easy to say ‘them’s the breaks’ the problem was that instant replay showed that the runner was clearly out. Umpire Joyce had blown the call.
The next day umpire Jim Joyce did something rare. He apologized to the Tigers and Galarrrago for the missed call.  At the time he thought he got the call right, however like the rest of the planet, Joyce could see on the replay he was wrong.  A tearful Jim Joyce also spoke to the media about his blown call.
Joyce could have remained quiet on the subject.  Umpires are not required to do daily interviews with the media.  Umpires have made wrong calls before and off hand I can’t remember a referee of any type apologizing for his error.
Both the pitcher and the ump have received their share of media attention.  NBC's Matt Lauer told Joyce he was going to use the umpire's willingness to admit to his mistake and apologize for it, as an example for his kids.
This apology could be an example to kids (old and young) for three reasons:
First, Joyce made no excuse for his error.  As a veteran umpire it was his job to get the call right.  Apologies are often followed by a qualifier such as “I am sorry, but it wasn’t my fault because…”  Everything after the 'because' negates the apology.  In this case Joyce went directly to Galarraga an apologized.
Second, the Tigers and Galarraga accepted the apology.  They could have belittled the umpire or smeered his name for his error.  Instead the Tigers accepted that a human error had been made.  Accepting apologies when a once in a lifetime opportunity has been lost is hard which shows the character of Galarraga.
Third, the real cause of the problem is the Dinosaur Mentality that runs major league baseball.  The CFL, which many consider to be a second class league, allows each team to call for one video review per game.  Last year Major League baseball changed the rule half way through the season to allow video review of home runs.  Obviously we don’t want every pitch reviewed…but how many minutes more would a baseball game be if there were two video reviews?
The simple answer is we will find out.  Within the next year the Almost Perfect Game will be the catalyst to bring baseball into the 21st century with video replays.  Getting the call right is more important than preserving baseball tradition.