A-Rod's call

Madame Cura didn't like it, but I thought it was one of the funnier things I've seen in a long time.

With his team leading by two runs following his RBI single in the top of the ninth, A-Rod was running between second and third after Jorge Posada had popped up the potential third out.

As Rodriguez went behind third baseman Howie Clark, who had camped under the ball, he appeared to shout something toward Clark, causing him to back off the play. The ball fell in for a single, allowing a run to score and extending an inning that wound up breaking the game open for the Yankees.

"I said, 'Hah,' that's it," Rodriguez said. "I was almost past third base. I was surprised the ball bounced."

The Blue Jays didn't see it that way.

"I was under it and I heard a 'Mine' call, so I let it go," said Clark, who thought the call came from shortstop John McDonald. "This is my 16th season, granted most of them are in the minor leagues, but it's never happened once. It happened tonight."

That's why most of them have been in the minor leagues, buddy.

And, hell, the Yankees won for the first time in about a week.

But what about the purity of the sport?

UPDATE: Emma Span gets it exactly right, as does one of the comments to her post:

"if that's what he did..."

nobody can even be sure, but we're ready to throw him under the bus anyway.

it is a little league play. like the hidden ball trick, which is usually recounted with an attitude that such plays harken back to a time of innocence and youthful whimsicality or some such nonsense.

this isn't watergate.

what it is is funny.

if the tables were turned and it happened to the yankees, i'd be pissed that they fell for it, not that it was tried.

And, for the record, Madame Cura said after the play, "Derek Jeter wouldn't do that." But Derek Jeter decoys runners at second All. The. Time. Often successfully. He's applauded for that. Head's up baseball. A-Rod decoys that day's call-up from the minors who was "camped under the ball" and it's splashed across the back page of the tabloids, proof -- together with his choice of companionship -- of his moral failings.

And I suspect that the next time Toronto's in town there will be an "HBP" next to A-Rod's name in the box score the next day. It's why I watch baseball every night. Ya never know.

And yes, I've written more about this crazy play this morning than I have about Joe Lieberman's one-on-one with the troops, the latest revelation from US Attorney-gate, or the proposed "cease fire" (not even the defeatocrats have suggested that one). So what? I got my priorities.