Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
August 19, 2008
Replay Speedbump

The umpires are cool to instant replay right now:

Umps said their governing board voted Tuesday to boycott a conference call with management intended to discuss implementing replay, angry that their concerns aren't being addressed.

Major League Baseball responded by saying it canceled the Wednesday call because it doesn't have a replay agreement with the union.

"A lot of the procedural issues necessary for instant replay to be implemented need to be worked out," World Umpires Association spokesman Lamell McMorris said. "Major League Baseball needs to step up to the plate and iron out these issues."

Shouldn't baseball people use metaphors from other sports?

There appears to be a long list of issues the umpires want resolved. It may be a few more weeks before this system gets used in games.

I would still prefer to see it tested during spring training games. That way, all the bugs get worked out and a wrong decision doesn't matter.


Posted by David Pinto at 07:45 PM | Umpires | TrackBack (0)
Comments

David, I agree, the key is testing it out. Rushing it in is a bad idea, and it seems only the umpires have the sense to push back.

Posted by: Harry Pavlidis at August 19, 2008 07:57 PM

I have little patience for the antics of the umpires' union, but there is something to be said for not bringing an untried system in during the middle of a season. This might be one of those broken clock moments.

Posted by: M. Scott Eiland at August 19, 2008 09:21 PM

Will a spring training test really be that useful? Do the stadiums in Florida and Arizona have the same kind of foul pole crannies and stupid yellow home run lines that are the bane of umpires in the major league stadiums?

Posted by: Tor at August 19, 2008 09:56 PM

Good points Tor! Also, the hardward/software being installed is most likely fairly spendy; it's not likely that anyone wants to incur the cost of installing it in the Spring Training parks. Seems that worst that can happen starting with it now is (a) it won't actually help the umps, i.e. it won't show a good pic of what happened, and (b) it will cause some delays of the game.

Posted by: Zippercat at August 19, 2008 11:06 PM

Thinking more about those stupid yellow lines...

If we must have them, it seems to me there are all kinds of ways to produce a conclusive answer as to whether there was a home run, short of video replay. Just install some material (netting, aluminum foil, spikes) on the home run side of the line that will either leave a visual impression of the ball (a dent) or deflect the ball in such a way as to leave no doubt which side the ball hit on.

Such artifices never seem to be well thought out. Even the basket at Wrigley Field doesn't do the job sufficiently. I have seen at least two balls hit off the wall above the basket and then bounce into the field of play...neither of them were properly called a home run.

Posted by: Tor at August 20, 2008 08:43 AM
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