There is no bigger proponent for an automated strike zone than I am. If we can develop a system to make every call on the baseball diamond automated, I would be in support of that as well. I just feel the quality and talent of major league baseball would be enhanced if the hitter and pitchers actually knew what the strike zone is on a daily basis, instead of having to guess what it will be mid-game. Baseball is the only major sports were there are no subjective calls. There are no fouls or penalties that need to be classified. Everything is binary. Ball/strike, safe/out, fair/foul. The only subjective thing umpires have to do is determine whether to eject the manager after making a horrendous call on the field. Why add extra variables to such a simple system?
In the ALDS series better the Yanks and the Twins, Joe Mauer hit a fly ball down the left field line, that clearly landed fair by a wide margin as seen on the still picture. I say this is the worst call because in the playoffs, there are 2 more umpires down each line to make sure calls like these are accurate. Nice job getting your only call of the entire day wrong.
If only umpires, like athletes, were "merely cold, metal machines with no souls or heart."
ReplyDelete...They just have no souls or hearts :D
Soccer doesn't have review either although it's the largest sport in the world. Also, if everything were to be reviewed in Baseball, we would need at most one Umpire. The reason this will not be changed in the near future is that so much of the sport is centered around human error...It would overall bring down the fan excitement thus contributing to lower ticket sales. Although I am all for some form of challenge system in MLB, at this point, a total review process just does't make sense.
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