HTL still sorting out details of ugly finish to game

Jim Polzin  —  7/09/2008 1:57 am

The exact details that led to the premature ending of a Home Talent League baseball game Sunday afternoon at McFarland High School vary depending on the vantage point.

However, there's one point that everybody agrees isn't open for debate: the ugly finish to an Eastern Section game between McFarland and Monona was a black eye for an amateur baseball league that prides itself on being fan- and family-friendly.

The umpires stopped Sunday's game with Monona leading 2-1 in the top of the seventh inning after a tumultuous stretch that lasted about 10 minutes and included at least three members of the McFarland team getting ejected from the game. McFarland went from having a shot at upsetting first-place Monona to losing the game by forfeit.

HTL commissioner Pat Reilly on Monday was still sorting through witness accounts and contemplating a severe punishment for at least one of the participants.

The chaotic sequence of events started on the first pitch of the seventh, when McFarland pitcher Cory Schuchardt threw a fastball that struck home plate umpire Rich Fronheiser in the chest protector and knocked him back a few steps. Fronheiser immediately ejected McFarland catcher Pete Patten; Fronheiser said Tuesday that he felt Patten had intentionally let the pitch pass so it would hit Fronheiser.

"His glove was knee-high, center of the plate, and he never moved it," said Fronheiser, who was lined up just over Patten's shoulder on the pitch.

Fronheiser said he had no doubt that Patten had intentionally missed the pitch. The two had exchanged words an inning earlier after a disagreement about Fronheiser's strike zone.

"His only comment to me after I ejected him was, 'You can't prove it. You can't prove I did it intentionally,' " Fronheiser said.

McFarland manager Darrell Kranz came out to defend his catcher and was ejected after a heated argument with Fronheiser and base umpire David Thom.

Schuchardt was also ejected during the sequence in the seventh. Kranz said he was told Schuchardt was ejected because Fronheiser felt the pitcher was part of the plan to bean him with the first pitch.

It only got worse from there. After more arguing, Thom warned McFarland that it had to leave the field of play and regroup while it replaced its ejected players. According to Thom, some of the McFarland players instead began arguing about whether the pitch should be ruled a ball or a strike, so Thom called the game and awarded Monona the victory by forfeit.

"They were out of control," Thom said Tuesday.

Fronheiser and Thom headed for their vehicles, but Fronheiser returned briefly after realizing he forgot to leave the game balls with the home team. After he rolled the balls toward the field of play, at least one McFarland fan picked up the balls and threw them at Fronheiser.

"It was a nasty deal," said one witness who asked not to be identified.

In addition to addressing the issue of fan behavior, Reilly also has to determine if there was indeed a plot to have the pitch hit the umpire.

"If it is indeed proven to be intentional, there will be some severe penalties given out because we don't play baseball that way in this league," said Reilly, who added that he has received an e-mail from Patten and plans to sit down with the McFarland catcher to discuss the situation. "And if anybody wants to play that way, they can find another league."

Both Fronheiser and Thom are veteran umpires and each has served as the HTL's umpire coordinator at some point during their careers. Even if they were rookie umpires making bad calls, Reilly said that doesn't give players the right to take matters into their own hands.

"It's been our stance that if anybody has a problem with an umpire, you play the game, you get it over with then you talk to (league's board of directors), or you talk to the umpire coordinator about it and we'll figure out what's going on," Reilly said. "Nobody needs to take it upon themselves to deal with that matter in that way."

Although Patten was suspended for two games last season for arguing with an umpire, Reilly said Patten isn't a "habitual offender" and that the previous suspension was delivered to send a message.

"He's a little fiery," Reilly said. "Up to this point there's been no problem with him this year and no problems with McFarland.''

Kranz disputed the notion that any of his players would do anything to injure an umpire.

"It's a he said, he said," Kranz said. "The catcher missed the ball. It hit the umpire. It was a typical game, he was missing some calls. It was a 2-1 game -- nothing (bad) was going to happen. And then all of a sudden, the umpires walk off the field because we didn't get a catcher ready in time because our catcher got ejected."

Both Fronheiser and Thom said Tuesday that McFarland was showing no effort to regroup and continue the game. According to both umpires, Kranz and some of his players continued to argue.

"They weren't interested in the game starting up again,'' Fronheiser said. "They were just interested in escalating'' the situation.

Kranz didn't think his team was given enough time to replace its ejected players, although the man who was at the game and asked to remain anonymous backed the umpires' opinion that McFarland wasn't making much of an attempt to hurry.

However, the same witness said that Kranz and his players weren't the only ones to blame for the situation getting out of control.

"No one was innocent on this," the man said. "The umpires were right in the guys' faces, too. They all went overboard."

Nobody could argue that what had been a pitcher's duel and well-played game was ruined in a matter of minutes. McFarland, which filed an appeal because the game was stopped early, fell to 6-6 and into a fifth-place tie in the Eastern Section. Monona improved to 11-1 and remained in first place.

"I don't want a bad name for Home Talent, because that's not what it's about," Kranz said.

Reilly agreed and made it clear he was embarrassed by the situation.

"We like it when there's a couple hundred people who come out on Sundays," Reilly said. "Instead of paying $4 a gallon of gas to drive in to watch somebody that gets paid to play, drive up the street or walk up the street to watch the locals play instead.

"If there's baseball choices, we want to be sure we're one of them."

Jim Polzin  —  7/09/2008 1:57 am