I’ve watched the video of this supposedly ridiculous catch by Double-A Reading Phillies outfielder Jiwan James and I’m still not completely sold on it.  James appears to climb the wall and rob Bowie Baysox second baseman Jonathan Schoop of a home run with an amazing catch with his non-gloved hand, while losing his glove over the wall in the process.

James sells it like he caught it, and the umps ruled it a catch, but something just seems off.  The Phillies prospect completely whiffed with his glove, but somehow managed to come down cleanly with the ball in his other hand, which is what makes the grab so totally ridiculous.  But after careful examination and reexamination of the clip, it would seem that the ball must have bounced off the wall and into James’ chest where he was able to grab it before hitting the ground, which would mean that this absolutely ridiculous, highlight reel catch shouldn’t have counted.

Either that or James pulled a second ball from his pocket a split second after bouncing off the warning track, which is a lot less plausible scenario when you think about it.

Here’s James’ astounding and dubious catch so you can make your own judgement…

That was so beautiful that my heart wants it to be a catch, but my head tells me it isn’t.  Logic and reason makes me sad sometimes.