John Saunders Has Lost His Brain

Now for the latest ESPN idiocy (seems to be a common theme):

Astros/Cubs on Monday Night Baseball. Gary Thorne, Orel Hershiser, and Steve Phillips are the announcers. Top of the 4th, Geovany Soto hits an inside-the-park home run (not an easy thing to do for a catcher). Replay clearly shows the ball hit the wall in a spot that should have been an automatic home run. Not a big deal--same result, and Thorne et al. note this.

Here's where it gets stupid: Phillips compares that ball to the ball Carlos Delgado hit on Sunday night in the Mets/Yankees game that appeared to hit the foul pole (it was originally ruled a homer, then overturned and ruled a foul ball. You can see the video here, and also see that the ump has admitted his mistake).

The announcers then throw it to John Saunders in the ESPN studio, who shows the Delgado ball and makes the argument that the ball missed the foul pole entirely. Even if this was true, the ball hit the wall first, clearly on the fair side of the line!

So, what Saunders is saying is that if a ball hits the top of the outfield wall and then bounces into foul territory, it's a foul ball. Perhaps this is a new rule! I have some other new rules: 1) If a foul ball hits the top of the wall and bounces into fair territory, it's a fair ball. 2)If a ball hits second base, it's an automatic triple. 3)If you make a shot from behind the potato salad, you get 3 bonus runs.