Red Sox (Indig)nation; Umpire K's Lowell

I hate losing. And I hate the Yankees. And I really hate losing to the Yankees. And yes, the crappy whole is greater than the crappy parts.

I also hate injustice. And I know there are starving people in lands of plenty, and crooks get away with it, but blown strike calls are injustice too. They pervert truth and put a penny on the tracks of destiny.

With one out and the tying run on first in the bottom of the 9th in a 1-0 game and Mike Lowell at the plate, Mariano Rivera and human umpire Marty Foster teamed up to punch out Lowell.

Admittedly, the level-headed-give-peace-a-chance-let-science-have-its-say part of me wasn't a thousand percent sure of this salt-in-the-eye-Mr.-Fuji-tag-team-machination until after the game, because the so called 'My 9' television station in New York- a station, I assure you, of which I own none and which I have no right to prevent others from using- didn't see fit to replay the pitch from any angle other than the crooked one from which they first showed it.

But according to MLB Gameday, it looked like this

See that, pitch number 8? You know, the one that's belt high, oh, 3 or 4 inches off the plate inside? You know, the one that made temperate-tempered Mike Lowell jump up and down and then look like this?

Yeah, they called that strike 3. Lowell, up to that point, had a righteous AB, fouling off tough cutters away. Al Leiter and David Cone astutely pointed out Lowell's ability to turn on the inside pitch, and Rivera pitched him away. That Lowell would get punched out on his strength- the inside fastball- was particularly unjust, and egregious. He was cheated, the natural conclusion of his at-bat interrupted. He was made to look weak precisely where he is strong. That's not justice.

Neither was this.

I'm still bitter. Indignation doesn't expire.