Yankees Win Amid More Home Run Controversy

The New York Yankees found themselves in the middle of yet another disputed home run call last night, but this time things ended up going in their favor.

In the first inning of the Yankees series opener with the Twins, Justin Morneau hit a moon shot that was originally declared a home run.  It narrowly missed the foul pole, and manager Joe Girardi was on the field almost instantly to argue the call.

The skipper didn’t want to go down without a fight as he did the evening before after Billy Butler’s controversial home run.  Girardi decided not to push the envelope with the crew in Kansas City because he figured they would have known what the ground rules were.

It turns out they didn’t, and the home run was counted because, as VP of Baseball Operations Joe Torre stated, the umps misunderstood the rules.

So Girardi made sure to say his piece last night, and after the play was reviewed the decision was ultimately made to overturn the call.  Instead of a home run, Morneau’s bomb was only long foul ball.

This got Twins manager Ron Gardenhire a little hot under the collar.  In his mind there was no clear replay showing if the ball went fair or foul.

"“In my opinion, and this is what I told them: ‘If one replay shows it could be fair and one replay shows it could be foul, and no one is really positive, how in the heck do you change it?'” Gardenhire said. “I don’t get that. They told me they saw a view on TV. But I could show three views right here where the ball disappears behind the pole. It just depends on the camera angle.”"

Gardenhire was ultimately tossed, increasing his ejection count to 5 on the year.

New York went on to win 8-4.  While the deficit was larger than the 2 runs removed, that is a definite shift in momentum during the opening inning of a game.

But to me it looks like the umpires got the call right.  From the angle provided by this MLB.com clip, it appears the ball falls just to the right of the foul pole.

So the Yankees got to see some of the good and bad of replay on back-to-back nights.  While this is different than Wednesday night’s ‘misunderstanding’, it’s nonetheless ironic that controversy managed to find the Yanks again last evening.

For more on the Yankees, be sure to check out Yanks Go Yard.