It wouldn't take much for CC Sabathia to win a person's heart. The ability, the equanimity, the good nature, the hat. Why, when he decided to drop the periods in his first name, you didn't hear a peep out of the no-fun grammar cops.
Thus, it is with no surprise whatsoever that we report that he has handled this no-hitter thing way better than his pals of the Milwaukee Brewers. In fact, we fully expect him to come out soon and tell the team, "Look, if I'm not annoyed about it, why are you? So let's just drop it. We're going fine without it."
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| No-no or not, CC Sabathia's going to get very rich soon. (Getty Images) |
Except that the Brewers found the call, made by veteran scorer Bob Webb, to be an outrage, calling him 12 kinds of incompetent and immediately appealing the call to Major League Baseball's Why Did I Answer The Phone committee.
Which is fine, I suppose. I mean, if there's a mechanism for this sort of thing. "OK, stand in the locker room holding a bottle of champagne and we'll get back to you by Wednesday at the latest."
But manager Ned Yost acted like he just had a wasp inserted against his delicates, going on about how Sabathia had been cheated out of a no-hitter, and how Yost had been cheated out of a no-hitter as well. Yost is, as we know, a fairly excitable fellow.
So the Brewers appealed, with all the requisite fulminations, having Sabathia's back, etc. After all, he's winning them a playoff berth, and this is one way they can say thanks before offering him the Zito-Plus contract he will get this winter.
But Sabathia is the wronged one, and Sabathia gives every indication of giving exactly zero damns. That counts. Not only that, a no-hitter is a thing of the moment, not of a committee vote at mid-week, and Sabathia would almost surely feel like someone whined him to a no-hitter instead of him nailing it down on his own at the time. Trust us, he has sufficient confidence to think he'll have another chance.
And therein lies the central reason why the Brewers ought to say, "You know what? Never mind. Our guy is fine with it, and we have bigger dogs to shave."
This isn't about the sanctity of the scoring system, or whether this could be covered under the soon-to-be-very-elastic replay rules, or whether Bob Webb should be replaced by a CGI machine. The scorer system is fine, the replay rules shouldn't cover hit-or-error situations, and baseball wouldn't replace scorers with gingerbread houses because of the potential cost.
This is about whether Sabathia is sufficiently annoyed by the call to lose his considerable edge. This is about whether he would feel happy or sheepish by a no-hitter delivered by Federal Express. This is about the age-old adage that nothing matters as much as winning the game.
Which, we needn't tell you given that the teams were the Brewers and Pirates, was never in doubt. And the answers to those questions are as follows: Sabathia doesn't care.
Sabathia probably would feel silly, because this seems a lot like a Little Leaguer's parents complaining about their kid's stats.
And they did win the game, and are closing in on their first postseason spot in 26 years. The culture demands that Sabathia do exactly what he's done, which is to slough off the call, take his latest complete game shutout and move on to Jake Peavy and the equally light-hitting Padres Friday night.
Now when he gets THAT no-hitter, he can celebrate twice as long if that works for him. But for now, he's been the pro he is asked to be, and the Brewers would do well to honor his stance by saying, "Well, if he can't be childish about it, how can we?" It's the answer to the age-old religious conundrum, "WWCCD?" What would CC do?
Well, we have the answer, and the Brewers ought to follow his lead.
Ray Ratto is a columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle.
