When I was growing up back in the 80’s and 90’s I watched as many Cubs games as I could. During that time, there weren’t nearly as many camera angles as there are today. However instant replay was available and most of the time baseball umpires got their calls right. I have never seen so many bad calls as I have the past two or three years in the major leagues.
Bad calls, from major league umpires, range from a fair ball called foul three years ago in a meaningless game to a blown call at first base that ruined a no-hitter for a Detroit Tiger pitcher. In between are awful ball and strike calls to the old neighborhood plays at second base where the guy is obviously off the bag. While there is something to be said for the human element to the game of baseball, there is also something to be said for getting calls right. When umpires can’t get calls right, it hurts the game. They are taught to listen as much as see the play. It doesn’t appear to me that they are doing either.
The only solution to make sure calls on the bases are correct is to expand the use of instant replay. While instant replay should not be used for every call, it should be used for plays at first base, disputed force out calls, and fair and foul calls. I realize that baseball games are long enough…too long sometimes. Viewing the replay by another umpire in the scoring booth would be the best way to go. Most of the time the decision is pretty easy.
There is really no decent solution to fixing the bad calls for ball and strikes. Umpires seem to have their own strike zones which is not how it is supposed to be done. Cubs TV analysis Bob Brenly half-jokingly wants to make the K-Zone take over for the umpire. At the very least Major League Baseball needs to make sure that they work with umpires to make sure the strike zone is uniform for everyone.
Over the past couple years the quality of the umpiring in the MLB has declined significantly. While they get most of their calls correct, many obvious calls are missed. This can be rectified by better training and expanded use of instant replay. To make the game as fair and balanced as possible we owe it to the fans and the players to make sure that the calls by the umpires are correct.
Related articles
- Last Night’s Winner: The Case For Robot Umpires [Last Night's Winner] (deadspin.com)
- MLB leaning toward expanding instant replay for next season (cbssports.com)
- MLB leaning toward expanding replay for 2012 (sportsillustrated.cnn.com)
