I got a call from my mom last week, all riled up about a Minor League Baseball incident that occurred down in Daytona Beach, Fla., where an umpire seemed to have left his sense of humor at home before heading to the ballpark.

It was during a Minor League game between the Daytona Cubs and the Fort Myers Miracle. One of the umpires made a controversial call at first base. The Cubs’ manager argued the call and then the ballpark’s public address intern, a 21-year-old University of Illinois senior named Derek Dye, decided to play an audio clip of “Three Blind Mice.”

For most fans at the park, the music seemed quite fitting for the call and the relaxed atmosphere of the ball game. It was a Minor League Baseball game, after all.

As it turned out, the only person at the game who didn’t think the music was very funny was home plate umpire Mario Seneca, who ejected Dye from the stadium and ordered the public address system silenced for the rest of the game.

Everyone at the park, judging by the online video of the incident, thought the Cubs’ manager was being thrown out, but actually Seneca was pointing to the press box yelling at Dye.

“You’re gone!” Seneca yelled. “No more music!” According to The Daytona Beach News-Journal, announcements over the ballpark’s sound system for such things as batters coming to the plate or pitching changes also weren’t allowed after Dye was ejected.

After realizing who had just been booted out of the game, most of the crowd continued to boo the umpire after his call. Everyone in the stadium, including the players, thought Seneca’s call was over the top. While umpires may lack a sense of humor, you would think an umpire working a game at that level would have thicker skin than Seneca did.

This wasn’t some Little League Baseball game with a bunch of angry dads yelling at a volunteer umpire. This was a professional baseball game with an umpire who should be somewhat professional. Instead he got his panties in a gigantic nasty wad over an English nursery rhyme and flipped a lid. Seneca quickly became the 2012 king douche of professional sports. I’m not sure he’ll ever be able to live this one down.

“The good news is that I called my league president afterwards, and he said I did the right thing,” Seneca posted on his Facebook page, according to MLB.com. “His opinion is pretty much the only one that matters, since he’s my boss.”

That statement from Seneca gets a double-thumbs up from me. This guy really was cut out to be an umpire. He should go far in his career as being the overactive bad guy.

For Dye, he’s become a national star because of the ejection and has since been inundated with interview requests including ESPN and ABC’s Good Morning America.

“I'm just kind of not believing this right now,” Dye told The News-Journal the day after the incident. “It's quite an experience. I guess this will be my legacy at Daytona. The story has gone nationwide.”

As it turns out, Dye isn’t the only person to get into trouble for playing the nursery rhyme at a ball game. An organist by the name of Wilbur Snapp was ejected from a game in 1985 after he played “Three Blind Mice” during a minor league Clearwater Phillies game. Like Dye, Snapp’s ejection received national attention. The incident made Snapp famous, and until he died in 2003 at the age of 83, he would sign autographs “Wilbur Snapp, Three Blind Mice organist.”

Apparently there is some rule in place that keeps ballpark organists and public address announcers from going too far in the booth in making fun of players and umpires. I think we can all agree that a rule should be in place. You can’t have someone with a microphone commenting on everything that goes on in the game, but to simply play a nursery rhyme and be ejected for doing so seems a bit over the top.

I’ve seen worse things from people working the public address booth back in the old Mile High Stadium in Denver. After a terrible call by the referees on the field, two blank lines would highlight back and forth on the scoreboard. Everyone knew what to do and the next thing you knew there were 70,000 pissed-off Bronco fans rhythmically chanting “Bull-S**t! Bull-S**t! Bull-S**t!

I don’t ever remember the scoreboard operator getting kicked out of the stadium. Hell, I’m pretty sure the referees were concentrating on the game they were working and could care less about what was going on in the stands. Okay, so maybe comparing NFL referees to some slouch of a minor league umpire is like comparing Bruce Springsteen to Richard Marx, but you get the point. If the rule that allows for the ejection of Dye is truly an enforceable rule, it’s a stupid rule. And if Seneca doesn’t have it in him to ignore a 10-second nursery rhyme, than he’s no better than the stupid rule, especially if he enforces it.

Of course, Dye is probably happy he got ejected. He’s a national media phenomenon. He’s famous. He’s probably got a contract in place to be the next Joe Buck.

What’s funny here is that I’m all fired up about some minor league baseball game in Daytona Beach while there are bigger fish to fry in Denver. As respectable citizens and Colorado Rockies fans, we should all be pissed off at the Rockies’ front office for enforcing another stupid rule.

As it is right now, Rockies fans are not allowed to wear paper bags over our faces to show the shame we are feeling with our beleaguered team this this year. In this supposed “Year of the Fan,” Rockies fans are not allowed to express their displeasure any more with owner Dick Monfort by placing paper bags over our faces while in Coors Field. This is done in every other major professional sporting complex, why not Coors Field? (Remember all those bags down in New Orleans over the years?) Monfort and Co. say the rule is for security reasons but I don’t buy it.

Like the poor umpire who can’t take a nursery rhyme, the Rockies’ ownership need to lighten up and find another layer of skin.



gjarvis@watchnewspapers.com or @gusgusj