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Baseball Today: Friday, May 4 »
May 3, 2007
There are times when you find an interesting story without even looking. Here’s one that just fell into our lap.
We’re just back form dinner in the cafeteria that serves the media and Red Sox workers. The dinner partners for Steven Krasner and I included Mike Shalin, the official scorer last night and again tonight.
Shalin’s always entertaining. He was trying to convince Steven and I to eat what he was eating.
``I don’t even know what this is,’’ he said as he took a bite of some kind of meat that was cooked into a square, ``but it’s really good.’’ He asked one of the workers if she knew. He kept eating (Steven and I stayed with the salad). When she returned, she told him it was Japanese-style fried chicken. Shalin simply said again, ``It’s very good.’’
When he wasn’t trying to find out what he was eating for dinner, Shalin told a story of how he had given Mike Lowell a stolen base this afternoon, when no one was playing. Well, actually, how the Elias Stat Bureau had ordered that Lowell be given a stolen base from Wednesday night’s game.
Lowell was on first base in the seventh inning and took off on a hit-and-run, which became botched when Oakland pitched out. Catcher Jason Kendall began heading out toward Lowell, now stranded between first and second. When Lowell took off toward second, Kendall’s throw was in the dirt and Lowell was safe.
Shalin, doing what seemed to be the proper thing, called an error on the throw and a caught stealing. It seemed the proper ruling.
Shalin reported, as he munched on his chicken, that he received a call from the Elias people today. They went over the play and decided that, according to the rules, Lowell should have been credited with a stolen base.
``It’s one of those crazy baseball rules,’’ Shalin said. ``It has to be a stolen base because the only throw made was by the catcher. If the first baseman had made the same throw, it would have been an error, no stolen base. I was told that it’s one of the things they want to talk about changing when they meet during the off-season. It’s something that maybe happens once a year. But the way the rule is right now, it has to be a stolen base.’’
Shalin shrugged and said he understood. Then he went back and got more of his new favorite meal.
Posted by Paul Kenyon 
at 6:29 PM | Permalink
