Announcers run away from Gallo jog
DON’T know how much more juice I can muster to keep spitting into the storm for both of us.
All I know is that I’ve neither heard nor seen it this bad. Never knew that the most conspicuous truths must be left unspoken, as if we can’t handle or grasp such truths, or are unworthy of them as if we’re too stupid to recognize what we can’t miss.
Last Friday night in Boston, the Yankees’ Joey Gallo hit a high fly toward right. Once blithely known as a “can of corn” as per grocers easily catching canned goods after knocking them with a pole off a top shelf, the ball was lost by right fielder By the time it was retrieved and thrown home by Arroyo, two runners had scored, but Gallo was thrown out at home attempting an inside-the-parker.
It was plain to see that unless an unexpected barrier arose (perhaps a presidential motorcade’s sudden appearance between second and third), Gallo would have easily scored — had he run hard all the way to first. But he didn’t. He left the batter’s box with a capitulating jog, another act of systemic minimalism that has replaced winning baseball on the highest-paid — obscenely paid — level. And after Gallo was tagged out at home, he rose with a smile, which was noted and approved by Yankees and YES regular substitute play-byplay man Ryan “RahRah” Ruocco.
Still, on the Yankees’ regular exclusive Friday night Amazon Prime Video streaming “platform” — it’s a “platform,” like a cliff from which to be shoved — no mention was made, even after replays, that Gallo hadn’t bothered to run hard initially.
Analyst David Cone, again relying on the his selective eyesight and judgments that prevent his standing as reliable truth-teller to YES’s paying subscribers, joined in Ruocco’s Sgt. Schultzian ignorance. We must’ve been seeing things!
The next night on Fox, Yankees at Red Sox, that Friday play reappeared. The point: Arroyo panicked, recovering in time to nail Gallo, but not before two runs scored.
But again, the indisputable fact that Gallo jogged halfway to first went ignored, as if we again couldn’t see or know better. This time that truth was ignored by Adam Amin and A.J. Pierzynski.
Why? Why has this disregard for the truth in televised sports events — ignoring or refuting what we can plainly see — become standard?
If I ever find out, I assure you, you’ll be the second to know.
By Wednesday, after Gallo walked against the Reds to lead off the third inning, Michael Kay said, “Now Gallo’s a good baserunner,” adding, “but he has to watch out, [Mike] Minor has a very good pick-off move.”
As reader Alex Burton soon wrote, Gallo “in eight big league seasons, has averaged 3.37 stolen bases per year.” And he only has one the past two seasons.