Fire. Jim. Joyce.

Armando Galarraga should have made history tonight. In a way, he did. But not in the way that he would have liked.

Following Dallas Braden and Roy Halladay, Galarraga became the third MLB pitcher to throw a perfect game in 2010... until Jim Joyce blew the biggest call of his career at first base.

With 2 outs in the 9th inning, Jason Donald grounded out to Miguel Cabrera, who tossed the ball to Galarraga covering at first base for the out. But then, the unthinkable happened, as Joyce called him safe.

This is safe, apparently.

Fire Jim Joyce. That is all.

Pictures courtesy of Jose3030.

You Can Never Have Too Much Young Pitching

Today on First Take, ESPN's increasingly ridiculous and cheesy morning show, Jay Crawford discussed the best young pitchers in baseball with The Boston Globe's Gordon Edes, Rob Parker of ESPNNewYork.com, and Tim Kurkjian of ESPN's Baseball Tonight.

When asked which young pitcher they'd build their team around for the next decade, all three of them gave some pretty questionable answers, in my opinion. Kurkjian started off the discussion by picking Nationals prospect Stephen Strasburg, Parker selected Yankees starter Phil Hughes, and Edes picked Jon Lester of the Boston Red Sox.

With all due respect to these esteemed gentlemen who make their living talking and writing about the game of baseball, they all dropped the ball on something that should have been one of the easiest questions anyone has ever asked them.

The answer is clear, and it's really not even close. 24-year old Tim Lincecum, who already has 2 National League Cy Young awards under his belt, is the obvious choice. No offense to Hughes, Strasburg and especially Lester, but Lincecum has been the best pitcher in baseball since the day he arrived in San Francisco, and he's not stopping any time soon.

Without further ado, here are my picks, in order, of starting pitchers that I would want to pick to build my team for the next decade. Enjoy.

1. Tim Lincecum, 24, San Francisco Giants
As I already said, he has 2 NL Cy Young awards in his first 2 full seasons, and he's already leading the NL in K's this year with 83. His career ERA is an amazing 2.93, and his K/BB ratio is 3.07. He leads an immensely talented Giants rotation that also includes Matt Cain and Jonathan Sanchez, and he'll probably be adding a lot more hardware to his trophy case in the years to come.

No pitcher has ever won 2 Cy Young awards in their first 2 full seasons, and Lincecum could win a 3rd this year, if Ubaldo Jimenez cools off a little bit later in the year.

2. Felix Hernandez, 24, Seattle Mariners
Everyone talked about Cliff Lee going to the Mariners to be their ace, but it's debatable that Lee is the best starter they've got. While he has been pretty outstanding over the past few years, Felix Hernandez has been every bit as dominant. He put in a Cy Young-worthy performance last year, and carries a 2.78 K/BB ratio over his career.

3. Jon Lester, 26, Boston Red Sox
He has already beaten cancer, and then he beat the Colorado Rockies in the World Series clincher in 2007. He also threw a no-hitter against the Royals in 2008. The question is, who or what CAN'T he beat? While the talk continues to be about guys like Josh Beckett and John Lackey in Boston, Lester has been one of the best power lefties in baseball.

He leads all active pitchers with a .727 career winning percentage, and he is off to a great start in 2010, with a 6-2 record and a 2.97 ERA.

4. Stephen Strasburg, 22, Washington Nationals
This could end up being the biggest snub on my list. Based on pure potential alone, Strasburg could wind up being the best out of all of these players. That having been said, he still hasn't even made his MLB debut. He is blowing through the minor leagues, and we'll see him pitch in a Nationals uniform for the first time next Tuesday, June 8.

5. Ubaldo Jimenez, 26, Colorado Rockies
He's the early favorite for 2010 NL Cy Young, with an incredible 10-1 start, including a 0.78 ERA, 70K's, only 26 walks, and he has only given up 1 home run so far this season. He threw a no-hitter earlier this year against the Braves, and in his only loss, he gave up 1 run on 2 hits.

He doesn't have a long term history of this kind of domination, but he has always had great stuff, and shown flashes of brilliance. As he continues to mature, he could be a true ace for the Rockies for a few years, something they've never really had at any point in franchise history.

Honorable mentions:
6. C.C. Sabathia, 29, New York Yankees
7. Phil Hughes, 23, New York Yankees
8. Zack Greinke, 26, Kansas City Royals
9. David Price, 24, Tampa Bay Rays
10. Justin Verlander, 27, Detroit Tigers

Mike Brown: From Coach Of The Year To Coach Of Nothing. That's What You Get For Letting LeBron Run The Team For You.

In 2008-09, he was handed the NBA's Coach of the Year award. In one short year, the Cavaliers apparently realized it had nothing to do with Mike Brown, and everything to do with LeBron James picking up the Cavaliers and carrying them on his back.

Brown was one of the league's worst coaches this year, especially in the playoffs against the Celtics, when he made absolutely zero adjustments in a series that ended with the Cavs getting dominated in 6 games.

It's really not that hard to win a few games in the NBA when you have the most talented player on the planet. It does, however, take a decent coach to push a good team over the hump and make them a great team. That's something that Mike Brown is incapable of doing, and even a #1 seed and a trip to the Eastern Conference semi-finals could save his job this time.

They'll be another job in the future for Brown, but don't expect much of him. Especially when he doesn't have the "give the ball to LeBron and get out of the way" offense to rely on.

When Even Your Own Teammates Are Sick Of You, Maybe It's Time To Check Yourself

I first wrote about this over a year and a half ago, when Francisco "K-Rod" Rodriguez was breezing past Bobby Thigpen's single season saves record, and acting like every one of his single-inning outings was the equivalent of achieving world peace and curing cancer at the same time.

Now, even his own teammates are tired of his attitude, including his ridiculously over-the-top celebrations every time he manages to make 3 outs in a save situation.

Last year, Yankees reliever Brian Bruney confronted him about it. This year, his teammates are less than thrilled with the way he complains in the bullpen, and his overall attitude among the team.

This guy's a supremely talented pitcher, and he always wants the ball in big situations, but it's all of the other times when you have to look at him and wonder how he might be hurting his team. Whether through his teammates getting beaned in response to his celebrations, or just having a bad attitude in general, he needs to realize that he's just a one-inning pitcher, and he should behave accordingly. Take a page out of Mariano Rivera's book, K-Rod, and pretend you have some class.

Relax.

People are already getting nervous about the Celtics, after they lost Game 4 to the Magic in overtime. Here's a word of advice: Stop.

The Celtics still have a 3-1 series lead, and they've played better in Orlando than they did in Boston. The Magic still have no answer for the Big 4, and Dwight Howard still can't shoot free throws. Paul Pierce lit up the Magic for 32 points, even with his critical misses in overtime, and Rondo had his worst game of the series, and the Celtics still pushed it to overtime.


The Celtics played about as badly as we've seen them play in weeks, and they were still one key shot away from sweeping the Magic. Keep your heads up, and we'll see them finish this off on Wednesday. Book it. Done.

The Best Of Three That Never Happened

I hate to count my chickens before they've hatched, but this is what we'll see again shortly, once the Lakers and Celtics finish disposing of the Suns and Magic, respectively.

This year's Finals should have been the 3rd in a row between the NBA's two most storied franchises, but Kevin Garnett's injury last year flipped the script a bit. Now, they're on a collision course again.
Both teams are playing as well as they've played all year, and their experience is benefiting them greatly against teams that were hot coming into the conference finals, but have ran into the wall.

Get ready for another round of Lakers-Celtics in the finals. Who are you picking to win?

Game 6, In Which LeBron Doesn't Choke, But It Doesn't Matter

LeBron James will take a lot of heat after tonight's loss to the Celtics. It's most likely his last game in a Cavaliers uniform, and soon he'll be accepting a huge pile of money to take the weight of a new city on his shoulders. The consensus is that it will be New York, but that's certainly no guarantee.

You might hear a lot of people bash LeBron's performance in Game 6, and it looked like he was less than inspired at times.

While that's not exactly what you want to see from arguably the best player on the planet, this loss wasn't his fault. Did LeBron choke in Game 5? Yes, absolutely. But this one was a different story. His 9 turnovers were troublesome, but his 27 points, 19 rebounds and 10 assists all led his team, and he really didn't get a whole lot of help.

Mo Williams was a beast in the first half, shredding the Celtics D with 18 points. In the second half, he virtually disappeared, going scoreless for the first 11+ minutes. After that, Shaq was the only Cavalier with double digits, dropping 11. The Cavs as a team shot 38.4% from the field, and were never really able to control the game.

On the other hand, the Celtics saw big performances from many of their players. Rajon Rondo was his typical self, with 21 points, 12 assists and 5 steals, and Kevin Garnett had 22 points and 12 boards.

Even Rasheed Wallace came up with 13 points for the C's, and was a huge spark at times off the bench. Tony Allen made some incredible plays that swung momentum several times, including a ridiculous dunk over half of the Cavaliers defense.

The bottom line here is that LeBron's legacy does not hang in the balance. He's still arguably the greatest basketball player on the planet, and at age 25, he has a lot of years of dominant play ahead of him. He'll win a ring. Whether it's with the Knicks or someone else, it will happen. He's just too good to fail. Write that down.