In the Dodger Stadium press box Sunday I asked the same question to three broadcasting legends.
I asked Vin Scully, Jaime Jarrin and Dick Enberg if they had ever seen anything like what happened here Saturday night.
They gave the same answer. All of these guys with about 50 years of watching major league baseball games had never seen anything like it.
The Dodgers had a 6-4 lead in the ninth inning against the last place San Diego Padres, a team which struggles to score runs. The Padres scored once but the Dodgers were one strike away from ending the game.
That’s when it happened, something that will be talked about for many years.
Kenley Jansen, who currently has the job of closing games, was pitching. The Padres had runners on second and third and the batter had a 2-2 count.
Jansen began fiddling with his spikes. He made the mistake of turning his back from the runners as he did this. Everth Cabrera broke toward home. Jansen was caught off guard. When he did throw the ball it went past catcher A.J. Ellis. As it rolled toward the backstop Ellis made an attempt to tag Cabrera. Umpire Greg Gibson called Cabrera out before he realized Ellis didn’t have the ball
The runner on second, Will Venable, went to third and kept going. He scored too, and the Dodgers lost, 7-6.
Scully told me he’s been asked if, during his broadcasting career he’s seen everything that can happen in a ballgame.
“I’d never say that, because who knows what will happen next,?” he said. “And Saturday night was an example.’’
He paused for a moment and added; “And if you’re old enough to have seen everything you’ve probably forgotten half of it.”
Jarrin became the Dodgers’ Spanish language broadcaster in 1958. We became friends when I used to go to spring training in Vero Beach, Florida each season. We’ve talked often through the years.
“Never anything like that,” he said. Never anything close to that.”
A few minutes later I saw Enberg, who has retired from his long, award-winning career broadcasting various sports for NBC. He now lives in San Diego and broadcasts televised Padre games.
I can’t remember anything like this,” he said.”Maybe it happened in a Little League game but I haven’t heard it happened there either.”
To the Padres’ credit, they had baserunners who were alert.
‘I saw what Jansen was doing,” said Cabrera. I cheated a couple of steps to see if he’d turn around. He didn’t, so I started for home.”
When Gibson called him out, Cabrera asked the umpire, “how can I be out when he doesn’t have the ball?” Gibson then turned and saw Ellis chasing it to the backstop.
And then came the final piece of the bizarre play. As Venable came home, Ellis hadn’t returned from the backstop and Jansen didn’t cover the plate.
“Dirt got caught in my shoe and I can’t pitch like that,” Jansen said about his action that started the game-ending play.
Manager Don Mattingly chose to protect his young relief pitcher rather than criticizing him.
“He’s been doing a good job for us,” said Mattingly.
I wondered if Mattingly would display his confidence in Jansen by bringing him back the next day to save a game or give him a day off. We’ll never know because the Dodgers lost to the Padres again, 7-2 and there was no late inning lead to protect.
The Dodgers had beaten the Padres 10 straight times in their meetings at Dodger Stadium. Now they’ve lost the last two.
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