COMMENTARY

By Tim Dahlberg

updated 11:03 p.m. ET Oct. 13, 2005

The best thing about instant replay is that it’s so, well, instant.

If baseball had it, the Los Angeles Angels more than likely would have been up at the plate once again Wednesday night before Doug Eddings ever had a chance to make another clenched fist.

Why bother, though, when one low pitch may become the most watched, most debated — and most overanalyzed — third strike in the history of the game?

Mistakes happen. Sometimes they seem to happen for a reason.

Before Eddings gave fans a reason to care, all the squeeze plays and sacrifice bunts weren’t enough to entice them to pay attention to this snoozer of a playoff series.

Throw in some controversy, though, and watch the ratings soar.

There’s no instant replay in baseball, but there’s plenty of replays everywhere else. By now, surely every living American has watched A.J. Pierzynski’s dash to first base.

Everywhere but in the White Sox clubhouse or on the team plane to California, that is. Manager Ozzie Guillen wasn’t about to let anyone know he secretly appreciated the gift from umpire Eddings.

“I don’t need the controversy thing,” he said.

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Guillen might not, but baseball surely does. Last year at this time the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox were in the middle of a pennant series for the ages. They had history on their side and they had stars to watch.

This year all the American League had was one team with an identity crisis against another with a severe inferiority complex. The Angels couldn’t figure out what town they were playing in, while the White Sox were constantly reminded they weren’t the lovable Cubbies.

On the field they were two teams with personalities that mirrored each other, clubs built on small ball and pitching and kept together by strong-willed managers. Take away a couple of stars and they could switch uniforms and nobody would notice.

That all changed when the unlikely trio of Eddings, Pierzynski and Josh Paul met around home plate in the ninth inning of a 1-1 game. There were 41,013 fans in the stands in Chicago and 40,000 of them likely didn’t know who Paul was, couldn’t spell Pierzynski if they were spotted the “z” and the “y” and wouldn’t recognize Eddings without his ball and strike clicker.

Now the three names will likely become a part of baseball lore.

Sure, the argument can be made that instant replay would have solved this one. But it’s a lot more fun to put humans out there, take your chances and, hopefully, live to play another day.

And that comes from the losing manager.

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“I don’t think the replay is anything that we should bring into the game,” Angels manager Mike Scioscia said.

The key, of course, is whether the pitch thrown to Pierzynski bounced before finding its way into Paul’s glove. Replays seem to show Paul caught it, and the backup catcher must have thought he did because he rolled the ball back toward the mound.

Behind the plate, though, Eddings wasn’t so sure. He stuck out his right arm then clenched a fist in what seemed to everyone who has ever played or watched the game to be an out call.

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