SELLING A CALL.

SELLING A CALL. One of my brother Elmer’s favorite baseball stories is about a call Ron Luciano made. Ron Luciano was an umpire in the majors from 1969 to 1979 who was known for his flamboyant calls. Luciano told the story in this article (the whole article is a masterpiece of storytelling.) Luciano had to make a call on a fly ball down the line, but he couldn’t see the ball because of glare. Luciano says: “The first thing taught in umpires’ school is make a call. Right or wrong, make a call. In this situation my only option was to try to fake it. I had a 50% chance of being right. But, because I wasn’t positive, and I knew it was a close call, I decided to give it the full Luciano special. I was going to sell it so hard, no one could possibly doubt I knew what I was doing. I leaped high into the air. I twirled my hand. I spun around. I shouted at the top of my lungs. I blew up a small sandstorm.” The problem was that Luciano had guessed wrong. He consulted with other umpires and changed the call. The manager the new call went against was the formidable Dick Williams. Both Williams and Luciano knew that Williams was going to complain enough that Luciano would have to throw him out of the game. Williams told Luciano: “I want you to throw me out of the game the same way you called that a fair ball. I want you to leap into the air and make funny circles with your hands and I want to hear you shouting….. Then I want you to start spinning around like a damn top and I want it all in one motion and I want you to yell so loud that the people back in California can hear what a rotten umpire you are…” Luciano did what Williams wanted. Luciano finishes the story: “Williams jammed his hands into his back pockets and nodded approvingly. ‘That’s all right,’ he said, and left the field.”