Happy last day of April. I hope it's been a good month for you. I've been working a part time gig, which makes it one of my busiest months of the year.
Baseball is back and so are some changes to MLB's (Major League Baseball's) rules. This year computer umpires are calling every pitch of the game, but so are human umpires. The human umpire behind home plate is still calling balls and strikes the entire game, but this year, pitchers and batters can challenge a ball-strike call if they think the ump missed it.
Image courtesy of nesn.com
With a lot of rain in April where I live, I've seen a lot of games. And I've seen a lot of ABS challenges. (ABS is the computer umpire calling every pitch.) I don't like ABS.
Many of the challenges show the umpire made the right call. But, everyone makes mistakes and the human gets overruled. Then a ball becomes a strike or vice versa. Teams are given two challenges per game and, as long as they are right in their challenge, they retain them. But, if they are wrong, they lose a challenge. Then miss another one, and the team has none left for the rest of the game. The problem is, as the game gets to the late innings, the challenges mess up the rhythm of the game, and it drags out the last inning or two. Combine the ABS challenges with the other challenge calls, and it slows down the pace of the game, especially if the score is tight in the last few innings.
My advice to MLB is to get rid of ABS challenges and let umpires do their jobs just as they have for the last 157 years. Maybe some fans like looking at a scoreboard image to see if the baseball touched an imaginary electronic strike zone. I don't.
Get rid of it MLB and, while you're at it, re-evaluate the other video replay challenges allowed too frequently in major league games.
