CC Sabathia — who has been absolutely on fire since losing the periods in his name — threw a one-hitter on Sunday for the Brewers. Since then, there has been a fair amount of controversy and, frankly, whining on the part of a red-hot Milwaukee club over whether the hit really should have been an error on the pitcher, thus allowing Carsten Charles to enter the record books with a no-hitter. The Brewers are appealing the official scorer’s decision, while Doug Melvin is questioning the entire method by which plays are scored. If you haven’t seen the play in question, have a look-see; and now, we will end the controversy: it was a hit all the way, and should remain a hit, for multiple reasons.

1) While the official scorer’s assertion that the ball was spinning and the runner was “two-thirds” of the way to first base might be exaggerations, all the ammunition he really needed was this: when have you ever seen an infielder attempt a bare-handed play, miss it, and be charged an error? Rarely, if ever. When an infielder goes to a bare-handed attempt, that’s a signal that he considers it a do-or-die play that can’t be made with the extra split-second required of fielding with the glove and transferring to the throwing hand.

2) Would Sabathia have thrown out Andy La Roche had he fielded it cleanly with his bare hand? Quite possibly. Would he have thrown him out if he fielded it with his glove? Maybe. But whether Sabathia would have thrown out the baserunner is immaterial once he fails to make a tough play. There are plenty of plays ruled infield hits based solely on the fact that the play would have been even simply close if it had been executed cleanly.

3) This is baseball. Snap judgments are made all the time, and we really don’t like the idea of players and managers whining about official scoring decisions and lobbying to have them overturned (which happens more and more frequently these days). To us, Sabathia’s game would have been tainted more by an error ruling that resulted in a no-hitter, rather than a hit ruling that led to the one-hitter.

Discuss.

*OK, so the Twins are tied for first; Vikings/Packers on MNF is six nights away; and if someone gave us even one reason to care about college football, we would officially be inundated by sports. If you would rather discuss any of these things rather than a non no-hitter that happened two days ago in another city, feel free.

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(Not pictured: David Eckstein holding up both Prince Fielder and CC Sabathia).

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