Over 20 million are watching the World Series, which means that forty million eyes saw home plate umpire Jeff Nelson’s whack-job strike zone, and firstbase ump Brian Gorman’s washed double play calls on Thursday night. Let’s stay on this topic for just a little while longer.

A reader typed in about FOX’s new “super” breakthrough about the speed of the ball coming out of the pitcher’s hand and when it reaches the plate. One call down to my old physics professor at Princeton and it confirmed that the measurement of velocity takes time and space to meet it’s zenith of force before gravity and air resistance take over. A ball coming out of a pitcher’s hand is probably slower at that point than when it reaches the plate. So what’s FOX to do? Give us FOX Trax plus, plus? And even though their clever little strike zone box they love to show with the prefacing tithe to MLB that it’s “unofficial” (so why show it?), more than often shows up umps, is that box set up at the front of the plate? If so, why are the stop action results often where the catcher catches it?

Let’s also not get too down on first base ump Brian Gorman. Both plays he blew were very close. His angle was behind the play and even when he watched the replay later, he maintained it was a catch by Phillies first baseman Ryan Howard and that O.J. was not guilty. You can also blame the whole crew on that one because they came together and didn’t throw Gorman under the bus. But why did Howard throw to second for a tag instead of crawling over to first to double up Jorge Posada? Chase Utley being safe was also close, but a make- up to wash the play Gorman’s heart was stlill overbeating from. Too bad it would have meant two on with Howard coming to the plate. That’s what you call a game changer. And all us 20 million want is to get the call right. Only the backward thinkers stand in the way of progress.

These thinkers want the game as it always has been and argue that its beauty is from Doubleday’s original vision. They’d prefer it be played as it was in 1918 when there were 16 teams and the Red Sox beat the Cubs 4-2 in the World Series. When bats were made of tree trunks and balls were so dead that the Red Sox’ Babe Ruth led the AL in homers with 11. They’d probably also be against flu vaccine because in 1918 “a flu pandemic was good enough to kill 50 million people (an estimated 675,000 in the U.S. alone) worldwide.” The problem with these folks is that they’re led by old thinkers like Bud Selig. Even with the DH, the lowered mound, the juiced ball and tendons from your leg sewn into your elbow, the game needs to hold back progress, so a logical and simple thing to impliment is argued about and held back.

Only the virtuecrats who need to see plays from every angle, multiple times, would slow down the game if instant replay were instituted in baseball. Otherwise, baseball could probably correct a call in under 20 seconds and show the other leagues how it should be done.

But “Boring” Bud Selig had this to say before game one in New York: “I’m not sure it would contribute to the improvement of the sport. If you begin to expand replay, it is not only injurious to the pace of the game, but it open’s up a Pandora’s box.”

Not that Bud’s scheduling the World Series into November hurts the pace of the game, or the any number of other things (aside from setting up a committee to study it) that could be done to speed it up. God forbid that he’d limit commercials, give a guy an intentional walk without the pitches (in defense, there could be a wild pitch or a guy reaching out to hit one), limit time outs and mound visits by players, disallow stalling tactics, or fighting. And Pandora’s Box was actually “Pandora’s Jar” to the Greeks, “who feared her unleashing evils on mankind — ills, toils and sickness – and hope.” Getting the call correct, eliminating coaches arguments, umpire conferences and explanations to the benches is certainly not unleashing ills, toils and sickness on the game. It would speed up the game. But he got one thing right, not going to instant replay gives up all hope.