Jim Joyce is the man

[MileHigh]

The game's best umpire. And, yeah, he missed a call on the 27th out of a perfect game. And it tore him up -- and probably still does every day.

Whatever.

Here's something bigger. He saved the life of a worker at Chase Field by performing CPR.

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20120821&content_id=37090842&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb

While he was performing CPR, Joyce was singing the song "Staying Alive" as a way of keeping the compressions going at the right time.

Joyce asked Powers if she remembered him singing to her.

"She didn't remember that," Joyce said. "But she told my wife she remembered my voice. I was yelling for her to come back and everything. She said she recognized my voice, so that's really kind of cool."

A big league umpire for 24 seasons, Joyce gained notoriety in 2010 when his missed call at first base cost Detroit's Armando Galarraga a perfect game.

Certainly Powers and the entire D-backs' organization will now remember him for an entirely different reason. As he prepared to work Tuesday's game, Joyce was stopped by D-backs day of game employees and front-office personnel. Everyone, it seemed, wanted to thank him for what he had done.

"I'll be very honest with you," said Joyce, who teared up at times while being thanked. "The way I look at it is, somebody needed help and I was fortunate enough to know what to do. I just looked at helping someone who really needed it. She was in bad shape and needed help."

 

[buckweaver]

Incredible human being. Always was, still is.

 

[Batman]

That. Is. Awesome.
Obviously, I don't know the man personally, but Jim Joyce seems like a true class act. The way he handled the aftermath of the Galarraga debacle was pitch-perfect. And this ... this is something else. Right person, right time.

 

[D-3 Fan]

Agree on everything on Joyce. And for the assholes who continue to rip the guy after what happened with the Galarraga near no-hitter (fans basically), if this doesn't shut them up and start giving him due respect, nothing will.

Joyce was stand-up then after his mistake and stand-up today.

 

[Knighthawk]

I've dealt with a lot of umpires after controversial calls. Almost all of them will talk to a pool print reporter with no video allowed, and they almost always say the same thing: "I made the call that I thought was right."

Jim Joyce, after making a mistake that was much worse than any other I've covered, didn't demand a pool reporter, didn't only give one canned answer and didn't dance around the issue of what he had done. In my 20-plus years in the business, it remains the most memorable interview I've ever done. There's not a close second.

Great umpire. Better person.

 

[HanSenSE]

Agreed with all of the above. And to the newsreader on one sportstalk story who found this strange and had to bring up the blown call twice in his report, there's clues for sale at Melky Cabrera's website.

 

[LongTimeListener]

There is one hell of a Sportsman Of the Year story to be written about that guy.

 

[dooley_womack1]

Jim Joyce's tears could cure cancer. Too bad Jim Joyce never cries.

 

[DanOregon]

The beat on Stayin' Alive is what you try and match for compressions. Underwent training a few months back. And the mouth to mouth thing isn't taught any more.

 

[kingcreole]

I kept the Sports Illustrated issue the week after Joyce's botched call. Few sports stories moved me the way that one did. 99.9 percent of umpires/officials/referees either hide or come up with a lame excuse when they blow a call. Joyce manned up.

He's an awesome dude, and what he did at Chase confirms that. He's moving up my list of "People I'd love to have a beer with."

 

[Chef2]

He made a tremendous amount of baseball fans after the perfect game incident.

He has now made a tremendous amount of fans who couldn't care less about baseball.

A tip of the hat to you sir.

 

[Huggy]

I kept the Sports Illustrated issue the week after Joyce's botched call. Few sports stories moved me the way that one did. 99.9 percent of umpires/officials/referees either hide or come up with a lame excuse when they blow a call. Joyce manned up.

He's an awesome dude, and what he did at Chase confirms that. He's moving up my list of "People I'd love to have a beer with."

Thought this follow-up was pretty good too....

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/otl/news/story?id=5993137