Challenging The System
Robot umps are nigh, and it's one more thing to argue about.
For the first time in baseball, teams will be able to officially challenge balls and strikes next season when MLB introduces ABS – their inevitable Automated Ball-Strike video system, tested in Spring Training this year, as well as at the All-Star Game – which will allow teams a limited number of challenges to technology-led outcomes.
Tom Verducci at Sports Illustrated has all you need to know.
Among the questions he asks and answers is “Aren’t we losing the human element?”
“Yes, if you consider an obvious blown call as a human element worth preserving. The limit on challenges is designed with the same purpose replay is used on the bases: nobody wants to see games decided on an egregious call.
“And ABS adds a new layer to the human element: the strategy and skill of when to challenge. Catchers are the best at getting a call overturned (56% in the spring training test). Pitchers are the worst (41%). Hitters were in the middle (50%). Now a catcher who is expert at judging the strike zone will have a competitive edge for his team. Judgment on the zone and when to challenge will be a huge part of the catcher skill set.”
With the impact on pitch-framing by catchers obviously going to be a big consideration as the new system beds in, Andrew Baggarly at The Athletic runs down who might be the winners and losers.
“For [Giants catcher Patrick] Bailey and other pitch-framing savants, the saving grace is that MLB isn’t going full robot.
“Rather than use high-speed cameras to automate all balls and strikes, which was among the systems tested at the Triple A level when ABS experimentation began in 2022, the league will implement the challenge-based system it used in selected spring training ballparks earlier this year.”
Like the introduction of the pitch clock a few seasons back, I wasn’t sold at first but came around, so it might turn out to be the same with this. Any change that makes the game more accurate in its outcome can’t be a bad thing, but I guess my one reservation is probably around putting a limit on the number of challenges.
Just like with play reviews, a bad call doesn’t become a good call late in a game (when it might matter more) just because a team has run out of challenges; while making the limit and knowing when to challenge part of the “skill of the game” does seem to be removing something that umpires – whose performance has been improving – should be there for in the first place.
But like every other technology, we’ll see how it goes. If it works, we’ll find we barely talk about it.
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Every Game Counts
But then, so did every game in April, and May. The most valuable quality for any team is consistency; but it’s the result of a broader, widely-spread inconsistency that brings us to this kind of entertaining conclusion to the regular season.
For example, Tuesday night’s game in Cleveland completely epitomised the struggle for the post-season, as the Guardians and the visiting Tigers faced off in a crucial AL Central showdown. Back in the first week of July, Cleveland was about 15 games back of Detroit for the division lead. By Wednesday they were tied in first place with 5 games to go.
Jeff Passan called it “one of the great surges and collapses we‘ve ever seen”.
Turning point in this game was a strange sixth inning, when the Tigers’ reigning AL Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal unravelled after hitting Cleveland’s David Fry in the head as he was attempting to bunt. At first it looked like the ball had come off Fry’s bat and onto his face, but the replay showed it was a straight shot. As ESPN reported:
“With two runners on, Fry squared to bunt and Skubal’s pitch drilled the designated hitter in the nose and mouth area. As Fry collapsed, a distraught Skubal immediately dropped his cap and glove and covered his mouth in disbelief.”
So now we all head into the final weekend, with half the league’s teams still relevant in some form. Two division titles and three wild card berths remain up for grabs; and there are seeding implications all over the place, reports CBS.
Tyler Kepner at The Athletic calls the situation a “land of confusion”. But it’s all a joy to watch, especially when your team has already clinched and – whisper it – seem to have regained their momentum at a good time. At least, some of them have.
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Nailed-on Hall of Famer calls it a career
“It hasn’t been all roses, I know that … I’m super grateful now, looking back, to get to say that I spent my whole career here and I will spend my whole career here.”
The Dodgers claimed their 12th Division title in 13 seasons, with an 8-0 blowout of the Diamondbacks on Thursday. That was 37-year-old Clayton Kershaw’s 14th title with the team, and his celebration was the vibe we all need.
[Broadcaster]David Vassegh, covering postgame TV and radio, “asked Kershaw if he wanted his shirt back from the top of his head. “No, I don’t want my shirt back,” Kershaw replied. “I don’t want goggles, I don’t want a shirt, I hardly want pants, Dave.”
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This Week’s Game Notes
Heading into the final weekend of the regular season, who’d have thought I would end up seeing more games involving the Pittsburgh Pirates than any other team in this – once again – shortened trip?
It’s genuinely always a joy going to PNC, the beautiful cityscape makes it still certainly in my top three parks to see a game. Pirates fans and their city provide a genuinely great atmosphere and they deserve better in the seasons ahead.
Saturday 20 September, Pittsburgh Pirates v Oakland As, PNC Park, Pittsburgh PA.
After a disappointing last home start for likely NL Cy Young winner Paul Skenes earlier in the week, Bubba Chandler stepped up in the Pirates’ penultimate home game of the season to help the Bucs over the A’s behind two solo homers by Nick Yorke and Brian (not Ryan) Reynolds . Chandler combined with two relievers for a one-hitter as Pittsburgh ended a five-game losing streak (four of which had been against the Cubs, who have been on a streak of their own since clinching).
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Tuesday 23 September, Cincinnati Reds v Pittsburgh Pirates, Great American Ball Park, Cincinnati OH.
I was telling my recently-retired friend Prof Chris Lamb, with whom I went to this week’s games, that really, all any fan wants at the start of the season is for your team to be competitive – and to have their fate in their own hands – in the final week. And so it was for his Reds, after they swept the Cubs last week.
Whether the Cubs could do them a favor against the Mets remained to be seen, (they didn’t that night) but the Reds couldn’t keep things going on Tuesday night, falling 4-2 to the division’s bottom team, with all the runs coming in the second inning.
Earlier, we had an excellent visit to the Reds Museum and a behind-the-scenes tour of GABP led by a former scout and team executive before the Reds – with, appropriately, the Pirates in town – held a ceremony celebrating Dave Parker, who was posthumously admitted to the Hall of Fame this year.
Parker, the winner of the inaugural Home Run Derby in 1985, established the non-profit 39 Foundation to work to advance the cause of research and treatment of Parkinson’s Disease.
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Wednesday 24 September, Cincinnati Reds v Pittsburgh Pirates, Great American Ball Park, Cincinnati OH.
Tonight, despite a rainy outlook, it was Greene v Skenes, the teams’ respective aces, with the Reds looking to get back on track after last night’s disappointment. In the end, though, the home team lost another squeaker, 4-3 in eleven innings.
As always, I had a good time in Cincinnati – another town with loyal, knowledgeable and appreciative fans who deserve success. I’ll be back again next season to see how Tito is getting on.
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But the last word this week goes to the Atlanta Braves fan that I met in the hotel I was staying at across the river in Covington, Kentucky. He was there with his family – his wife and two lovely little boys who came down for breakfast in baseball-themed pyjamas. They had all gone to last night’s game and he told me they were in town for a follow-up appointment at Cincinnati Children’s for his younger boy – who was probably about three – who he said had a cranial condition.
I wished him all the best and told him my own youngest boy had undergone several hand surgeries before he was eight or nine, and now it is simply the biggest thrill for me to be able to go to a ball game with him.
Our kids’ well-being, we agreed, is something that always puts the outside world – including the baseball standings – in perspective. All of us should hold onto that old saying that exhorts us to be kind, because everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about.
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As always, thanks for reading. I aim to write a baseball-related post midweek and then a politics wrap at weekends.
Usually one is more sane than the other, particularly at this confusing and challenging time.
You can find a full States of Play archive here.
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