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2008 MLB Season
- Thread starter zioxide
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Nope, never. Sorry to disappoint you, but I am a baseball traditionalist to the bone. I've been a fan of the game for nearly 50 years and have never seen a way to improve it.
You also make it sound like missed calls in critical situations happen all the time. In fact they are very rare, and certainly not common enough to warrant changing a fundamental aspect of the game to "fix" it. Most importantly, you also don't seem to want to reckon with the fact that adding technology to umpiring does not necessarily make wrong calls right, it just adds a different form of interpretation, which is not necessarily more "right" than the judgement made on the field.
The umpires can always make the call on their own. They've been doing it for over a century. Again, replays are far from being consistently unambiguous evidence for what really happened. You are just introducing another level of judgement and undermining the authority of the umpires on the field. And to what real end? I don't understand why anyone would believe that replays are going to solve any problem that the game has actually got.
Once replays are introduced for one purpose, they will be demanded for others. I don't see any firewall against them spreading to other umpiring decisions. I mean, what is the logic to using them only for home runs? Any single call can change the course of the game. A foul ball, a strike, a ball, a tag, a put-out. You name it, the umpire could have been wrong and the outcome of the game changed. Where do you stop this madness, and why?
You can always point to a call or two, but the fact remains that they are rare, which is why you can point to them.
So you say, based on what? And how many blown strike three calls? How many tags missed? How many plays at the plate? How many foul balls called fair?
In short, you are not coming to grips with the actual issues. You'd ruin the game in a quest to "perfect" it.
Based on video evidence, the camera doesn't lie. I am not saying balls and strikes, those are judgement calls. But a ball over the fence is clear cut. It either is or it isn't. Add more umps to the outfield to call a home run. Why let a person who is 200 feet away get the call. They add more umps for the post season down the lines, why not have that all the time.
Actually, no. If it was that "clear cut" then you would not need instant replays. If it's a matter of whether a ball hits a fence above or below a line, then the camera can indeed lie, or least not provide conclusive evidence. In fact I've already offered up another example of when instant replays from multiple angles won't lead to an obvious conclusion, just a judgement made by a different person based on different evidence. Not objectively "right," just different.
The reason why you let the ump make the call is because umps make calls in baseball games. They always have and always should. You could make the same bogus argument that they aren't always perfectly positioned to call foul balls, many of which land far down the line where the ump is not going to get a good view. These calls are frequently questioned, and could be just as critical to the outcome of a game as a home run. So why not foul balls too?
The distinctions you are making are totally arbitrary, which is why once instant replay umpiring is introduced, it will have no obvious limits to its use. The integrity of the game will be damaged, permanently, just as it was when the DL was introduced.
Yep, see weekly them pulling out several angles on a close play ... without proof one way of the other.
HD broadcasts and big TVs may help from several angles.
But, not an ump looking at several angles on a studio monitor with a regular broadcast signal.
Heck even playing it on the HD Jumbotrons may not be good enough if the angle is bad.
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Sometimes they are right, sometimes wrong.
Can't always blame the umps when you are playing poorly anyhow.
HD broadcasts and big TVs may help from several angles.
But, not an ump looking at several angles on a studio monitor with a regular broadcast signal.
Heck even playing it on the HD Jumbotrons may not be good enough if the angle is bad.
---
Sometimes they are right, sometimes wrong.
Can't always blame the umps when you are playing poorly anyhow.
If you're in favor of instant replay umpiring for home runs and foul balls, then you have to be in favor of it for called third strikes, close plays at first, infielders stepping on a base on force plays before throwing, tag-outs, line drives that may have been trapped, checked swings, hit batters, and every other call that might be disputed and possibly made "right" by a video umpire.
That is the worst leap of logic you've posted about this yet.
And yes, on video, it's pretty damn obvious when a ball is a home run.
If it's a "leap of logic," kindly point out why.
And again, the question is how you logically argue against using replay umpiring for any controversial call if you allow it for home runs. I've asked that question several times now, but nobody has volunteered an answer.
Balls and strikes are judgement, even though the strike zone should be the same all the time we know it's not. A ball fair or foul is not an umps opinion, it either is fair or it's foul. Same goes for a home run, either it is over the fence or it isn't. If a ball hits the foul pole and the ump misses it doesn't mean it doesn't count it means the ump missed it and video would prove it. I use Sunday night's Yankee/Met game as an example. The ball clearly hit the pole in fair territory. You could even hear it hit the pole.
I find myself more and more convinced that IJ Reilly is correct on this, and maybe not just because he too is so passionately against the DH. 
What I'll add to this specific point is that balls and strikes aren't any more or less a judgment than a home run or a foul ball. Home runs are home runs because the ball leaves the playing field in flight and in fair territory. A foul ball is a ball that falls on foul territory (and other fun stipulations that we all already know). Those are both clearly defined and the play by play determination is made within those rules by an umpire.
Strikes and balls are no different. The strike zone is clearly defined and the pitch by pitch determination is made within those rules by an umpire. There is a 3-dimensional space over home plate that a pitch must pass through to be a strike. If it doesn't, it's a ball. The end. The strike zone is defined by home plate and the batter's body.
It's common to disregard an umpire's slightly larger or smaller strike zone as "just judgment," but it is no more or less "just judgment" than a home run or a foul ball. The rules don't state that a strike zone is whatever an umpire decides it is, the rules state:
At the very least, I agree wholeheartedly that you can't open up one home runs and/or foul balls to instant replay and not expect strikes, balls, slides, balks, etc. to follow. They are all rules, determined play by play by umpires. They are all open to human error. Just because a lot more pitches occur in a game than foul balls or home runs doesn't make called strikes and balls any less a rule with well-defined guidelines than the others.
What I'll add to this specific point is that balls and strikes aren't any more or less a judgment than a home run or a foul ball. Home runs are home runs because the ball leaves the playing field in flight and in fair territory. A foul ball is a ball that falls on foul territory (and other fun stipulations that we all already know). Those are both clearly defined and the play by play determination is made within those rules by an umpire.
Strikes and balls are no different. The strike zone is clearly defined and the pitch by pitch determination is made within those rules by an umpire. There is a 3-dimensional space over home plate that a pitch must pass through to be a strike. If it doesn't, it's a ball. The end. The strike zone is defined by home plate and the batter's body.
It's common to disregard an umpire's slightly larger or smaller strike zone as "just judgment," but it is no more or less "just judgment" than a home run or a foul ball. The rules don't state that a strike zone is whatever an umpire decides it is, the rules state:
MLB said:
At the very least, I agree wholeheartedly that you can't open up one home runs and/or foul balls to instant replay and not expect strikes, balls, slides, balks, etc. to follow. They are all rules, determined play by play by umpires. They are all open to human error. Just because a lot more pitches occur in a game than foul balls or home runs doesn't make called strikes and balls any less a rule with well-defined guidelines than the others.
Thank you benmrii, you explained this perfectly. Introducing video replay umpiring for one umpiring judgement opens the floodgates to all of them. If there was some logical break or firewall between home run judgements and other umpiring judgements then I might feel less passionate about this issue (though I'd still be against it) -- but in reality, there simply isn't any. This is the camel's nose under the tent for turning our graceful, historic game into a technology-dependent exercise, a concept I dislike with every fiber of my baseball-loving being. What amazes me most about this discussion is the degree to which some baseball fans (resisting the urge to put the word in quotes) think the game needs to be "improved." Bah, I say to that. Bah!
And to repeat, video umpires would not necessarily be more "right" than real umpires. They are simply using different evidence to make a judgement, evidence which can be just as ambiguous as what an umpire sees on the field. Every one of us has seen multiple instant replays from multiple angles and still can't say with total certainty, for example, whether or not a ball hit a foul poll. This is a game, not a science.
And to repeat, video umpires would not necessarily be more "right" than real umpires. They are simply using different evidence to make a judgement, evidence which can be just as ambiguous as what an umpire sees on the field. Every one of us has seen multiple instant replays from multiple angles and still can't say with total certainty, for example, whether or not a ball hit a foul poll. This is a game, not a science.
i just thought of something...do you think the umps are making some of these bad calls to stir up the replay controversy? not likely, but i wanted to see if anyone else thought about this too, because we had four blown calls in less than a week, and i can't help to think that one of them was intentional...
btw, we lost, big time, 11-1 to the dbacks, but as a side note, i'm happy davis won his first game. mets lost too, so willie may be gone on monday.
btw, we lost, big time, 11-1 to the dbacks, but as a side note, i'm happy davis won his first game. mets lost too, so willie may be gone on monday.
Yep, nice to see Doug back in the rotation, though the aftereffects of the cancer surgery could still take him out for a period if the thyroid replacement drugs get out of whack.
The umpires are deliberately undermining their own integrity and credibility? Even assuming that this could be true, to what end?
We seem to forget, the expression "kill the ump!" is as old as baseball itself. We only think we know all about each and every "blown call" today because of TV, and all of those half-witted announcers who have to blabber on endlessly and authoritatively about something or other for every second of the broadcast. If anyone is stirring up a phony controversy, it's them.
The umpire is not always right, but he's always the umpire. Complaining about umpiring is like complaining about the weather.
5 in a row for the Yanks, come from behind 6-5 win scoring 4 in the 8th.
Yeah, against the Mariners lol.
And you're finally not in last place!
At least we won this weekend.
You can't play the Royals everyday.
And you're not in 1st place anymore!
At least we won this weekend.
You can't play the Royals everyday.
And you're not in 1st place anymore!
Yeah, but you can't play the Mariners every day either. And they're a far worse team than the Royals.
Oh, and we start a series in Seattle tonight.