Sports
Opinion: End the blows against the beauty of baseball
The following confession may come as a shock to those who know me: I am now a conservative. When it comes to baseball, that is.
I watched the blown check-swing call that allowed the Dodgers to win a game against the Rockies last month in an improbable comeback and to the fury of Colorado fans. The ump’s clear mistake will only add to demands that check-swing calls be included in the instant replay protocol.
But check-swing subjectivity is a fundamental part of the way baseball is supposed to function: humanly, in sublime, sometimes maddening imperfection. MLB interventions to “fix” it — larger bases, the ghost runner at second base in extra innings, batters limited to one timeout per at-bat and, worst of all, the pitch clock — are blows against the beauty of the game.
Admittedly, these changes seem to be quite popular. Games had been running longer and longer with incessant pitching changes, dawdling batters and, yes, replay reviews. But what monstrous hubris to think we know better than baseball’s Original Framers! Ninety feet between bases, 60 feet, 6 inches between pitching rubber and home plate — these are divinely induced measurements. Start messing with tradition and the heart of the game is lost to hyper-regulated “reality.”
Baseball is not reality. It is myth performed by real bodies. And imperfection, which is also the unexpected, beyond the reach of metrics, is where the magic comes from — magical triumph and magical heartbreak, larger than life, operatic.
There is no doubt that soccer is the “beautiful game,” but baseball gives it a run for its money. Its own beauty has resulted from the gradual accrual of tradition, which has given us a poetics.
Languor is one of baseball’s essential characteristics. Seemingly nothing happens for long minutes; no one scores, no “bang-bang” double plays, just lazy fly balls and dribbled grounders; you are swayed by the lullaby of sun and beer into a somnambulant state.
And then “just like that,” as Vin Scully used to say, there’s a majestic home run blast, a leaping catch, a fierce duel between pitcher and batter, a spectacular strikeout. The explosion of affect is all the more powerful for having emerged so suddenly from the caesura. (Soccer fans experience a version of these symphonic changes of tempo on the pitch.)
Baseball’s temporality is inseparable from its physical dimensions, the space-time of the game. The vast swath of grass between outfielders, the closer quarters of the infielders, the tunnel of focus that connects pitcher, batter, catcher and umpire.
The imperfection of umpires is indispensable in the gestalt. Video appeals rob us of the opportunity to yell at the ump to get glasses, or suffer much worse things. A blown call can lead to simultaneous jubilation and heartbreak, with the losers rending their garments and smarting from the insult of being “robbed.”
All as it should be.
I say: Bring back smaller bags and keep stealing a base a rare art! I say: No more ghost runner (what did he do to deserve to be there?) and go on all night with punch-drunk players if that’s what the game demands. And most of all I say: Smash the pitch clock with an Adirondack bat. The timer is an abomination under baseball heaven, depriving us of the organic crescendo of tension in an epic at-bat in the late innings of a close World Series game (Kirk Gibson, 1988).
When I interviewed Scully after the Los Angeles riots-uprising of 1992, I asked him what he‘d said on the air about the chaos unfolding that first night, as a game was underway at Dodger Stadium. “I didn’t say a word,” he told me. He thought first of his responsibility to the fans and their safety — what if he caused panic? And he added: “There should be one place left where the rest of the world doesn’t intrude.”
He might as well have said baseball is sacred. Not to be messed with. Not even (as if it were possible) by history itself.
On all this, I come down as far more conservative than, say, old-school, bow-tied traditionalist George Will, who for once approves of the “progressive” in the form of the new rules he thinks augur a return of baseball to its one-time status as national pastime. The game, awash in play-by-metrics, Will has argued, is bloated not by poetic languor but by analytical ennui.
True that, Mr. Will. We agree about baseball’s slow death-by-numbers. At the end of the day, all the measurements miss the point — the ineffable beauty of a summer afternoon ever so slowly turning to night at the ballpark.
Some of us know when a cure is worse than the disease.
There is a reason baseball was famously the preferred sport of American literati in the mid-20th century. And the pitch clock wasn’t part of the poetry.
Rubén Martínez is a literature professor at Loyola Marymount University, the author of numerous books and co-creator and executive producer of the performance piece “Little Central America, 1984.”
Sports
Tom Izzo explodes on former Michigan State player in wild scene: ‘What the f— are you doing?’
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Michigan State head coach Tom Izzo has been known to get visibly angry with his players over his years in East Lansing, but what happened Monday night against USC was different.
Izzo let loose his frustration on a former player.
During the Spartans’ blowout over the Trojans, 80-51, Izzo was spotted unloading on former Michigan State center Paul Davis, who played for the team from 2002-06, after he caused a disturbance in the stands.
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Head coach Tom Izzo of the Michigan State Spartans reacts to a call during a game against the Nebraska Cornhuskers during the first half at Pinnacle Bank Arena Jan. 2, 2026, in Lincoln, Neb. (Steven Branscombe/Getty Images)
Referees pointed out Davis, who was a spectator, from his courtside seat after he was among many in the building who disagreed with a call in the second half. Davis stood up and shouted at referee Jeffrey Anderson.
Anderson responded with a loud whistle, stopping play and pointing at Davis. Then, Anderson went over to Izzo to explain what happened, and the 70-year-old coach went ballistic.
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First, he was motioning toward Davis, and it was clear he asked his former center, “What the f— are you doing?”
Davis was met by someone asking him to leave his seat, and that’s when Izzo went nuts. He shouted “Get out of here!” at Davis, who appeared to gesture toward Izzo, perhaps in apology for disturbing the game.
Izzo was asked about Davis’ ejection after the game.
“What he said, he should never say anywhere in the world,” Izzo responded when asked what happened. “That ticked me off. So, just because it’s 25, 20 years later, I’m going to have to call him tomorrow and tell him what I thought of it. And you know what he’ll say? ‘I screwed up, coach. I’m sorry.’”
Izzo quickly clarified that what Davis said “wasn’t something racial” and “it wasn’t something sexual.”
Michigan State Spartans head coach Tom Izzo protests a call that benefited the Iowa Hawkeyes during the first half at Jack Breslin Student Events Center Dec. 2, 2025. (Dale Young/Imagn Images)
“It was just the wrong thing to say, and I’ll leave it at that.”
Davis later met with reporters Tuesday, apologizing for his actions.
“I’m not up here to make any excuses. I’m up here to take accountability, to own it,” Davis said. It was a mistake that will never happen again. It was a mistake that’s not me, but, unfortunately, last night it was.”
Izzo said Davis was one of his “favorite guys” during his time playing for the Spartans. He had a breakout sophomore campaign with 15.8 points, 6.2 rebounds and two assists per game in 30 starts for Izzo during the 2003-04 season.
Head coach Tom Izzo of the Michigan State Spartans reacts during a game against the Nebraska Cornhuskers during the second half at Pinnacle Bank Arena Jan. 2, 2026, in Lincoln, Neb. (Steven Branscombe/Getty Images)
In his senior year, Davis averaged 17.5 points, a career-high, in 33 games.
He was taken in the second round of the 2006 NBA Draft by the Los Angeles Clippers. Davis played just four seasons in the league, his final one with the Washington Wizards.
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MADISON, Wis. — Can a team be in crisis just a handful of games into conference play?
UCLA is testing that possibility given what happened here Tuesday night as part of a larger downward trend.
Lacking one of their top players with guard Skyy Clark sidelined by a hamstring injury, the Bruins also were deficient in many other areas.
Defense. Heart. Toughness. Cohesion. Intelligence.
In a game that the Bruins needed to win to get their season back on track and have any realistic chance at an elite finish in the Big Ten, they fell flat once more.
Another terrible first half led to another failed comeback for UCLA during an 80-72 loss to Wisconsin on Tuesday night at the Kohl Center, leaving the Bruins in search of answers that seem elusive.
There was a dustup with 10 seconds left when UCLA’s Eric Dailey Jr. pushed Wisconsin’s Nolan Winter after absorbing a hard foul, forcing a scrum of players to congregate along the baseline. Winter was assessed a flagrant-1 foul and Dailey a technical foul that was offset by a technical foul on Badgers guard Nick Boyd.
About the only thing to celebrate for the Bruins was not giving up.
Thanks to a flurry of baskets from Dailey and a three-pointer from Trent Perry that broke his team’s 0-for-14 start from long range, UCLA pulled to within 63-56 midway through the second half. Making the Bruins’ rally all the more improbable was that much of it came with leading scorer Tyler Bilodeau on the bench with four fouls.
But Wisconsin countered with five consecutive points and the Bruins (10-5 overall, 2-2 Big Ten) never mounted another threat on the way to a second consecutive loss.
Dailey scored 18 points but missed all five of his three-pointers, fitting for a team that made just one of 17 shots (5.9%) from long range. Bilodeau added 16 points and Perry had 15.
Boyd scored 20 points to lead the Badgers (10-5, 2-2), who won in large part by their volume of three-pointers, making 10 of 30 attempts (33.3%) from beyond the arc.
Unveiling a turnover-choked, defensively challenged performance, UCLA played as if it were trying to top its awful first-half showing against Iowa from three days earlier.
It didn’t help that the Bruins were shorthanded from tipoff.
With Clark unavailable, UCLA coach Mick Cronin turned to Perry and pivoted to a smaller lineup featuring forward Brandon Williams alongside Bilodeau as the big men.
For the opening 10 minutes, it felt like a repeat of Wisconsin’s blowout victory over UCLA during the Big Ten tournament last March. The Badgers made seven of 11 three-pointers on the way to building a 20-point lead midway through the first half as Cronin continually tinkered with his lineup, trying to find a winning combination.
It never came.
He tried backup center Steven Jamerson II for a little more than a minute before yanking him after Jamerson committed a foul. He put in backup guard Jamar Brown and took him out after Brown gave up a basket and fumbled a pass out of bounds for a turnover. Backup guard Eric Freeny got his chance as well and airballed a three-pointer.
Wisconsin surged ahead with an early 13-0 run and nearly matched it with a separate 11-0 push. The Bruins then lost Perry for the rest of the first half after he hit his chin while diving for a loose ball, pounding the court in frustration with a balled fist before holding a towel firmly against his injured chin during a timeout. (He returned in the second half with a heavy bandage.)
Just when it seemed as if things couldn’t get worse, they did. Williams limped off the court with cramps late in the first half and the Bruins failed to box out Wisconsin’s Andrew Rohde on two possessions, leading to a putback and two free throws after he was fouled on another putback attempt.
UCLA almost seemed fortunate to be down only 45-31 by the game’s midpoint, though being on pace to give up 90 points couldn’t have pleased a coach known for defense.
Another comeback that came up short didn’t make things any better.
Sports
Dolphins’ Tua Tagovailoa open to fresh start elsewhere after disappointing season: ‘That would be dope’
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Tua Tagovailoa appears to be ready to move on from the Miami Dolphins – a feeling that seems mutual between the two sides.
Tagovailoa was benched for the final three games of the season due to poor performance. A day after the Dolphins’ season ended with a 38-10 loss to division rival New England, the sixth-year signal-caller appeared open to the idea of a “fresh start.”
Mike McDaniel speaks with Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa (1) in the fourth quarter of a game against the Buffalo Bills at Hard Rock Stadium on Sept. 25, 2022, in Miami Gardens, Florida. (Megan Briggs/Getty Images)
“That would be dope. I would be good with it,” Tagovailoa said Monday, according to The Palm Beach Post, when asked specifically if he was “hoping for a fresh start.”
When asked by another reporter if he understood “fresh start” as playing “elsewhere,” Tagovailoa reportedly confirmed it.
The remarks came the same day that head coach Mike McDaniel confirmed that the team would be approaching the 2025-2026 season with a competitive mindset for the position.
“In 2026, I think there will be competition for our starting quarterback. What that is and how that looks, there’s a lot that remains to be seen. It’s the most important position on the football field, and you have to make sure you do everything possible to get the best person out there on the field.”
Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa runs off the field during the first half of an NFL football game against the New England Patriots in Foxborough, Massachusetts, on Jan. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
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“Who that is – whether they’re in-house or somewhere else, that’s something that we’ll be extremely diligent on,” he continued. “But I know there will be competition for those reins. That much I do know.”
Tagovailoa threw for 2,660 yards with 20 touchdowns this season, but he struggled with accuracy and mobility, throwing a career-high of 15 interceptions. His poor performance comes just one season after signing a four-year, $212.4 million contract extension in July 2024.
Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa speaks during a press conference after an NFL football game against the Baltimore Ravens, Thursday, Oct. 30, 2025, in Miami Gardens, Florida. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
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The Dolphins face a serious decision regarding Tagovailoa, as releasing him next year would result in a $99 million dead cap charge. If the move is designated as a post-June 1 release, those charges would be split over two years, with $67.4 million allocated to the 2026 cap and $31.8 million in 2027.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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