CLEVELAND (AP) – Johnny Damon couldn’t believe it – and Craig Stammen agreed.
Stammen, attending his first postseason game, caught a disputed leadoff home run by New York’s leadoff hitter originally called foul by umpire Jim Wolf in the first inning of the AL playoffs against the Cleveland Indians.
“It hit me right in the stomach,” said Stammen, who was standing in foul territory behind section 116 at Jacobs Field. “It was fair all the way, but curving. It hit me, I dropped it, but got it back.”
Manager Joe Torre immediately ran out of the Yankees dugout to argue when Wolf, working the right-field line, emphatically signaled the ball foul. Plate umpire Bruce Froemming gathered his crew before overruling the call.
“It was completely fair,” Froemming told Indians manager Eric Wedge after the inning, saying he and first-base umpire Laz Diaz saw the play clearly. Froemming’s words were caught by TBS, which was broadcasting the game.
For a moment, it appeared as if the Yankees were on the wrong end of an umpire’s call – unlike the 1996 postseason.
Then, umpire Rich Garcia, who was at Thursday’s Game 1, ruled a ball hit by Derek Jeter was a home run when TV replays showed that 12-year-old Jeffrey Maier reached over the wall at Yankee Stadium and caught it before Baltimore’s Tony Tarasco could make a play.
Stammen was well out of play, but the problem for Wolf on Thursday appeared to be a sun glare reflecting off the right-field foul pole.
A couple hours before the game, Indians general manager Mark Shapiro spoke of using instant replay in exactly the type of situation that unfolded when Damon drove a 3-1 pitch from C.C. Sabathia into the lower deck.
“If we can do it efficiently, fast, and if it is a call where we know we can get it right – then how can we not (use it)?” Shapiro said. “In my mind, home runs and fair or foul balls, we should be able to that fast. And we should be able to get it right.”
Stammen, from Versailles, a town just north of Dayton, didn’t care either way.
“I’m a Washington Nationals fan,” he said. “I’m here because I love baseball.”
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