Dear ESPN

[yendi]

From ESPN's summary of the Braves/Phillies game:

Marlon Byrd looped a single to right field to end Hampton's no-hit bid after 7 1-3 innings. Placido Polanco's two-run single off Smoltz tied it.
Then in the ninth, Smoltz (0-1) blew just his second save in 28 opportunities.

I'm sorry, but putting an article with these two sentences on a sports site is about as bad as posting the most recent Laurell K. Hamilton book on a site devoted to good grammar.

If Smoltz allowed the tying run to score in the eighth, as is stated in the first sentence, he already blew the save. What happened in the ninth is that he got a loss.

Not knowing the difference between a loss and a save is, for a baseball writer, functional illiteracy.

The article is here. I'd like to think someone will correct it soon.

Comments

[bouncepogo.livejournal.com]

I might be disagreeing with you...let me ask for some more clarification:

Did Polanco's two-run single drive in Byrd? If so that run is earned to Hampton and not Smoltz, since any runners on base when a releiver comes into the game are earned towards them. Was the other runner driven one who got on base from Hampton's pitching?

Smoltz did blow the save.
Hampton got the loss.

[aussie-nyc.livejournal.com]

The winning run came in the ninth, all Smoltz. He gets the loss.

[yendi]

My point is, they said he blew a save. You blow a save when the game gets tied. If the run is charged to Hampton, there's no blown save, period.

And it turns out to have been a real blown save -- it took a two-run single (so Byrd wasn't the tying run, which was charged to Smoltz).

The've fixed it now.

Re:

[bouncepogo.livejournal.com]

Ah ok.

I think my head is spinning now. :)

[yendi]

Heh. Sorry -- I get a bit obsessive when it comes to baseball.

Re:

[bouncepogo.livejournal.com]

Do you collect baseball cards?

[yendi]

Nope -- I did as a kid, and I still glance at them at CVS with nostalgia, but even my geek/collector urges have limits. :-)

Re:

[bouncepogo.livejournal.com]

I probably have about 1500 collecting dust...just thought maybe I'd found a home for them but guess not! :)

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Nobody edits stuff anymore. Hell, I even had one of my own bloopers sneak thru yesterday... I said a monster RAID array was 1.7GB. err, you can't get a single DRIVE that small new these days, not unless it's solid state :)

*sigh* O Tempura, O Morels. :)

[xforge.livejournal.com]

Was it instead 1.7TB? If so, can I have it? I'll be good to it and it will have a good home and get backed up regularly and I'll only feed it the best files... = )

[terracinque.livejournal.com]

If a tying run had been earned in the eighth, but then the Braves scored more runs later in the eighth (or in the ninth), they'd still win and Smoltz would still get a save.

Then, after the ninth inning, Smoltz had no more game to save. So it's in the ninth that the save was actually blown.

[yendi]

Actually, technically the save is blown whenever the inherited lead is erased, even if it's not a save situation. So if Joe Relief comes in the sixth inning with a lead, and gives up enough runs to tie the game, he gets a blown save then and there.

And in the first situation you describe, Smoltz would get both the blown save and the win (which is not uncommon for some relief pitchers).

[digriz.livejournal.com]

I've noticed a general lack of editing anymore on many news sites, but especially sports-related. (espn, sportsline, cnnsi, etc) I don't know why this is. And I'm not even talking about the grammar, either....

[yendi]

I suspect part of it is a need for speed -- after the game ends, if ESPN has a recap before cnnsi, they "win." And with the web, it's easy enough to fix any errors after publishing it.