Complaints about replay are stupid

I will give John Farrell some slack here as he was frustrated about losing three of four to the Yankees. But his complaints about the new instant replay system fall flat on my ears. By my count, there have been two calls that the replay system has gotten incorrect. The one happened in the Red Sox - Yankees series where Dean Anna did lift his foot off the base and should have been called out. MLB stated the call should have been reversed. That was one of the two. Big deal.

On MLB Network's Intentional Talk program, it was mentioned that thus far 32 calls have been reversed with the replay system and 34 had been upheld. The time factor has not been that big of a deal and the only irritant is when the manager hangs around to wait to see if his people give him the thumbs up or not on whether to challenge the play. How is this slowing the game down when most of those plays would have been arguments between the manager and umpires anyway? The arguments take longer.

So the time is not a problem. Then what is? Yes, two have been botched. You would think with the system they have set up there would be no missed calls. But okay, two calls have been missed. But 32 have been overturned. That is 32 incorrect calls that would have stood if the replay system was not in place.

Two incorrect versus 32? Wouldn't that be a success under any kind of accounting? The bottom line here is that 32 calls would have been umpire goofs without the system. Is that preferable to Mr. Farrell or anyone else? I would not think so.

The entire idea of instant replay is to get the calls correct on the field. We are closer than ever before of making that happen with a margin of error of two calls. The instant replay is a big hit for me because the correct calls in games are what I want. I do not want games decided by a bad umpire decision. Now all we need is robot balls and strikes and I will be a complete happy camper. Good job, MLB. Keep it up.

Replay, Bud. Replay

Buck Showalter had every reason to be red in the face at the the call reversal that occurred in the sixth inning of the Baltimore Orioles game against the Tigers. And Major League Baseball should be red in the face too...with embarrassment. The original call by the first base umpire was correct. Mark Reynolds kept his foot on the bag on the throw from Manny Machado to get Peralta on a very nice play. The first base umpire, Jeff Kellogg got the call correctly. But after the Tigers' manager argued, Kellogg asked for help and got the wrong kind of help. Too bad Kellogg couldn't have asked for a replay. But we do not have replay in Major League Baseball.

This is an important series between two contending teams. The Orioles held a 3-1 lead in the game. The outcome of such an important game should not be determined by a bad call. And then the Orioles lose Mark Reynolds for the rest of the game because he knew he kept his foot on the bag and was justifiably upset the call was reversed. Reynolds and Showalter will be fined, of which the proceeds should go to a replay fund to end this madness.

Fielder would go on to hit a game-tying homer because of the outcome of this play. He might have hit the homer anyway, but that would have made the score only, 3-2 instead of a tie game. And the Tigers might have won the game anyway, but that is not the point. The point is that a play on the field should be called correctly and we have the technology to do that. So why not stop talking about it, Mr. Selig, and make it so?

Mark Reynolds might have been able to hit his own homer later in the game. We'll never know. What is known is that the replay clearly showed that Reynolds made a terrific play to keep his foot on the bag while stretching out to short hop the throw into his glove in time to beat the runner. Such a beautiful play should be rewarded. Reynolds' only reward was to get thrown out of the game.

These things simply should not happen. Say you like the human element if you are an old school poopface. But the only human element that should happen in a game of baseball should be what the players do on the field and whether they succeed or fail. Their successes shouldn't be taken away by the fallibility of umpires--not when we have the technology to fix it.

Even if you are glad the Tigers won, you can't feel good about a win coming on such an egregious situation. Fix this, Bud Selig, because it is getting really, really old.

Shocking but not Shocking

Tommy Lasorda and Earl Weaver were about as famous for their umpire arguing skills as they were for their managerial skills. Both had wonderful tantrums when they felt the umpire made the wrong call. And yet, each are on polar opposites when it comes to Instant Replay in baseball. Lasorda is all old school and wants the human element kept in. Weaver said the technology needs to be used to get it right. All of this, of course, comes from a recent study that found that twenty percent of close calls in games made by the umpires were wrong calls. The study is shocking, but for anyone who watches a lot of games, not shocking at all.

We can certainly see the evidence with our eyes when we watch the television. Just last night in the ESPN Sunday Game of the Week, Jose Reyes was called out at second and the replay clearly showed Reyes to be safe. The Fan watched the Yankees and the Red Sox yesterday and there were two blown calls in those games. You can cry, "human element," all you want, but this Fan seems to be squarely in line with most fans when it comes to having baseball officiated well. The post season last year was abominable when it came to bad calls. It was embarrassing. That's not a human element. That's a crying shame.

There are only two ways you can fix it when one out of every five calls is blown by the umpires. You either get better umpires or you move to technology. Getting better umpires is a problem. First, you have a union to deal with. Second, these guys are already supposed to be the best. Ideally, you would have to look at the selection process and figure out if you have a problem there. You have to weed out those umpires that are consistently poor in their decision making. You have to look at the training that is preparing umpires for their profession. All of that takes time and energy and a will to make it happen. All of that is problematic. After all, humans are involved with natural territorial feelings. Plus, humans are prone to always take the easy way out.

So if the second option is problematic, technology is your only way out. Nobody wants longer games. But you could shorten games with just a few simple rule changes (limit catchers going to the mound, limit time outs called by the batter when there is a runner on second, limit pitching changes in an inning, for just a few). That would take some time that could be used up for replay. The study linked above shows that there are about 1.3 close calls per game. So you are basically adding up to two chances in a game to review a call. That's not a lot and shouldn't take up a lot of time. And it is worth it if it means a correct call.

There is no question for this old school Fan that replay is the way to go.  Perfect it in Triple A if you have to first. Those calls in the Twins - Yankees series last fall were terrible and it took away from what the Yankees were to go on and accomplish because the calls tarnished some of the results. Jeter's famous home run in 1996 had a similar effect. Calls need to be right and if 20% of all close calls are blown and the human element can't do better than that, then another option has to be in place. It is too bad that we can't go back in time and review all those calls say twenty years ago to see if umpiring is worse now than it was then. This Fan would bet that that it is worse now than it has ever been.

In the linked piece that started this post, a telling short interview was given by Doug Harvey, a famous retired umpire who suggested with irony that we replace umpires with robots. He, of course, was defending the current system. But this Fan would be happier with robots  than with today's umpires. The Fan would love it if all balls and strikes were handled by technology. The Fan can't stand bad strike zones. It drives this old writer crazy. Well, you can't give a robot any way to tell if a runner is safe or out on a base. There just doesn't seem to be any way to do that. But that being the case, replay will give you the option of looking at the play again and getting it correct.

The bottom line is that we want ball players to decide the fate of the games and their own statistics, not an umpire.

Instant Replay

While we are on a roll concerning rule changes, the topic of Instant Replay has come up again because of the completely blown call in the Twins game earlier this week where Cuddyer was called out at the plate and replay showed how easily Cuddyer beat the tag. The run would have been the tying run and it was the last out of the game. The Twins might have won that game. Does baseball want that kind of notoriety?

One of the problems of Instant Replay is that it's not really "instant." It takes time for the umpires to go to their system and get the signal from the umpire in the sky (or wherever he is) for the proper outcome. Yeah, okay, that might draw out the game a little bit, but not any more than ten attempted pick off throws to first or three pitching changes in an inning.

In the long run, it's certainly worth it to get it right. Rob Neyer, lately one of our few mainstream voices of reason, correctly pointed out that the world hasn't caved in with the advent of the replay system already in place for homers.

Gardenshire, the manager of the victimized Twins said he wants a red flag like they have in football. Uh. No! Why not allow the manager of a team the right to question any call? Each game might have one or two disputed plays. Big deal! Review them! The technology is there. Use it.

There is no reason in this day and age that a call can't be questioned and put right when it is wrong. The one big problem is figuring out where all the runners should be if there were multiple runners on base. But that can be figured out. After all, there are four umps watching the bases at any given time. For those of you who say that human error is part of the game, you aren't living in reality. Human error is what brought the major automakers down. The Japanese showed the way using technology to limit errors.

The bottom line is that the players should determine the outcome of games, not the umpires. Doing anything possible to limit the latter from happening should be investigated, tested, perfected and put into place. Soon!