Lee at Gettysburg, Napoleon at Waterloo; historians will forever debate whether they erred at critical junctures by misunderstanding or misjudging the lay of the land. In a similar vein, Morgan Ensberg says on his blog that he was mis-positioned by Phil Garner at a key moment in the 2005 NLCS due to an optical illusion from Garner’s vantage point in the Minute Maid dugout.
6 thoughts on “Wrong Place, Wrong Time”
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Interesting. I also agree with one of the posters there that Garner should have been aware of the illusion. Ensberg did a nice dance around the question of why Garner didn’t know.
Looking further down in his comments, he said:
“I always like to remind people that baseball is business that is built around making money. I love the game of baseball, but I only pursued it because I could make a huge amount of money. If MLB players made $10,000 I would have gone out and found another job. Remember, I was a walk–on at USC anyway”
Sometimes honesty isn’t the best policy
MVH, I can’t disagree with you more on your post. You are trying to frame my response as though I am saying I only played because of the money. Is that what you think or do you think I was trying to say that I am a realist who was given an opportunity to make millions playing a game I love? I love to surf, but I can’t earn enough money surfing for a living. I like golf but again, I can’t make a living playing.
Honesty is always the best policy. Would you rather be lied to?
Morgan Ensberg
Sorry, I should have picked a better phrase. I should have said – “it may be true, but I wouldn’t have said it out loud.”
And no, I don’t blame you – $10,000 wouldn’t exactly pay the rent. I would like to think, though, that because you love the game, that it wouldn’t take millions to get you to play. I’d take it you would play for, say, $80k a year?
First off, Mr. Ensberg’s post is the coolest comment in the history of Baseball Crank, and I have been reading this site since 2002.
Second, I too share curiosity about the question raised by maddirishman. I’ve been to Minute Maid many a time, and did not know or hear anything about this optical illusion, just one of any of a hundred things you don’t realize as a fan. It’s a fascinating post — and certainly an interesting explanation — but still, one would think Garner would be aware of this issue by now. Perhaps in the heat of the moment, he forgot.
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