...preventing the Tigers' pitcher, Armando Galarraga, from throwing a rare (not so much this year, but in terms of baseball history) perfect game (even though the blown call did prevent my Indians from suffering a great deal of ignominy). But when I heard that the umpire's name is Jim Joyce, well, then, it all made sense. James Joyce as a baseball ump? Come on. The guy had about four eye surgeries for every novel he published! He was probably crooning "Take Me Out To The Ball Game" in Swahili or something when the ball was hit. Either that or he was unconsciously "streaming" gibberish about moocows and dying mothers and lapsed Catholics. I bet when the Tigers manager Jim Leyland came out to argue the call, Joyce just said, "Yes, I say, yes yes yes!" Don't tell me, the home plate ump was Sam Beckett, who, rather than calling balls and strikes, just shrugged his shoulders at every pitch. Was Al Ginsberg the third base ump, winking at the batboy, patting the butt of everyone who ran by him, and chanting William Blake poems in an effort to levitate the pitcher's mound? And was that Bill Faulkner at second base, nipping bourbon and calling everything foul? And let me guess, the three-man referee crew at tonight's NBA Finals opener will be Ed Poe, using a ladder to toss the jump ball, Frank Kafka, whistling charging fouls on everyone sitting on the bench, and Marc Proust, sniffing everybody's sneakers and launching into three-hour narratives about his boyhood shoes? True, sports and literature are two of my biggest passions, but the powers that be don't have to mix the two for my benefit. I certainly don't want to read a post-modern novel written by Carlos Zambrano, and if some pasty-faced guy named Tom Eliot starts giving out yellow cards at the World Cup, I'm giving up reading for good.
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