Jeff Kent, Goat in Blue

As a fan of the game of baseball more than any particular team, I place a high value on good sportsmanship. I’ve been watching the Dodgers a lot this season and, despite their rough start, enjoying the players and especially Joe Torre. What a bummer tonight to see their frustration boil over so stupidly. Jeff Kent’s force play at second is ruled safe, his foot apparently off the bag, by an umpire standing six feet away, staring straight at the play, and ruling immediately. Maybe he was wrong, but, hey, he had the best view in the house and it was too close to call on tv in slow-mo. Kent argues and argues, well past the point when he should have been thrown out, forcing Torre to come out and argue too. Then in the next inning he shoots his mouth off again, his face so contorted with rage he looks like the killer rabbit in Monty Python’s Holy Grail. He eventually gets tossed, as he should have, and forces, I assume, Torre to get tossed too, in the late innings of close game. What an idiot. It will take a while for the bad taste of that one to clear. In the meantime, there’s always the Angels to enjoy….