Umpires and Technology
by natsstats on Jun 21, 2010 1:06 PM EDT
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PrintWatching the Nats/White Sox game Saturday at Nats Park, I came to the realization that it’s time for technology to replace home plate umpires. Home plate umpire Sam Holbrook was a disaster. He had his own unique strike zone that made the game completely unwatchable. Two average pitching performances were turned into Cy Young auditions with Holbrook’s generous strike zone. Batters on both sides were unable to hit pitches called strikes, leaving the fans to stare at a 1-0 snoozefest.
On June 17th, the Wall Street Journal had an excellent piece (here) discussing major league umpires, Stephen Strasburg, and Pitch F/X. In it David Biderman wrote:
According to a consensus of umpires, a good umpire will make one bad call on a pitch every two innings—or about four or five per game.
(More after the Jump)
There were 247 pitches thrown Saturday. Batters did not swing at 134 pitches, leaving the outcome to the discretion of the plate umpire. Out of those 134 calls, Holbrook called 29 strikes that Pitch F/X noted as outside of the zone, and called 8 pitches balls that were inside the zone. I plotted Holbrook's strike zone on my NatsStats blog here.
The umpire’s union complains that k-Zone’s and the like are unfair because batters come in all sizes. Pitch F/X actually stores the top and bottom of the strike zone with each pitch. Also last time I checked, the plate didn’t widen and shrink with each pitch. There shouldn’t be any discussion whether a ball catches part of the plate or not. Clearly Holbrook had his own rulebook Saturday.
I can almost live with Greg Gibson’s botched call at first against Nyjer Morgan. I can’t live with an umpire making up his own strike zone. With MLB attendance down this year, the league needs to do as much as they can to make the game enjoyable. Watching batters struggle with an extra wide strike zone is not my idea of enjoyment. Listening to announcers tell me that the players need to adjust to an umpire’s strike zone is nonsense. The umpire needs to call the strike zone according to the rules. If he can’t do that, get another umpire, or better yet, use Pitch F/X live to call the zone.
The league could turn Pitch F/X on tomorrow for balls and strikes if they wanted. I know the league cowers at the feet of the umpire’s union, but at this point, a change needs to be made. Even lifelong baseball fans are going to stop watching games like these.
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I still like human strike zones...
…but guys that consistently mess it up need to be removed. Couldn’t tell from where I was sitting, but I feel that if guys can’t get it right they need to be able to be sent down just like players that consistently screw up need to be sent down.
Baseball has so many things that need fixing and so little ability and central resolve to do it.
Cool Hand Lannan has carried the mail in anonymity for two years. He'll carry the mail for at least two more! Give the man some defense and he'll give you the world. MOAR GROUNDERZ! MOAR DOUBLE PLAYZ!
Selig.
Baseball has so many things that need fixing and so little ability and central resolve to do it.
Selig is to blame for this. The game and technology have passed him by. Until Selig is gone, don’t expect any change improvement.
"We're through the looking glass here people!"
by LOUtheMETandNATSfan on Jun 21, 2010 12:25 PM EDT up reply actions
I actually was glancing at Bill James Historical Abstract at a Barnes and Noble recently...
…and he argued that half the reason that baseball struggles with stuff is that there is a decentralization of power where owners collectively have more power to rein folks in. Selig appears to be way too traditional and that’s an issue, but a lot of that has to do with his desire to kiss up to his constituency in a way that the stronger Faye Vincent may not have IMHO.
Cool Hand Lannan has carried the mail in anonymity for two years. He'll carry the mail for at least two more! Give the man some defense and he'll give you the world. MOAR GROUNDERZ! MOAR DOUBLE PLAYZ!
I don't think there's "so many things that need fixing".
Baseball as it is works very well. It hasn’t NEEDED fixing in decades, and the last time they tried to “fix” it we got this abomination called the “designated hitter rule”. In general, I don’t want the league tampering with the game — especially by adding silly crap like instant replay.
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
The flip side, though...
…is a World Series that was compromised at times due to obvious bad calls and a perfect game that was ruined by obvious bad calls. The world has not collapsed inward on itself due to instant replay in football, tennis, and home run calls for baseball.
I don’t care what you do, transparent accountability or instant replay but do something.
Cool Hand Lannan has carried the mail in anonymity for two years. He'll carry the mail for at least two more! Give the man some defense and he'll give you the world. MOAR GROUNDERZ! MOAR DOUBLE PLAYZ!
Why does it have to be transparent?
I don’t ask to know when the greeters at Wal-Mart are suspended or fired. I certainly don’t want my company to broadcast its adverse personnel actions either.
Can umpiring be better? Of course. But it’s not going to get much better, and in the age of high-speed, high-definition photography where we can tell at an instant whether the batter’s toe beat the deep throw from short by a millisecond or not, the fallacies of the humans who call the Major League games will become ever too clear. Umpires are right nearly all the time, and they have to make judgment calls on plays where a millisecond really is the difference between right and wrong. I’m inclined to accept most of the errors they make without fuss.
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
You do however notice that the greeter ain't there no more.
There should be an observable pattern for poorer performing umpires that can be tracked by those who watch or obvious demotions and promotions. I don’t have to know all of the data involved in.
I don’t want to see bad umps working regular season games and distorting outcomes. Or you can give bad umps more support with replay and more technical involvement in the play.
But like I said above, baseball does not acknowledge these things as problems so they won’t likely get fixed.
Cool Hand Lannan has carried the mail in anonymity for two years. He'll carry the mail for at least two more! Give the man some defense and he'll give you the world. MOAR GROUNDERZ! MOAR DOUBLE PLAYZ!
Wow...this is a tough one for me.
NATSSTATS…Have you recognized a trend in MLB regarding this, or is this a one time occurrence that happens every now and again? It’s very hard for me to imagine the game w/out the human aspect of having the umpire call balls and strikes. Granted, I don’t want to see a ballgame ruined because of human error, however, something would definitely be lacking if the home plate umpire were to be removed.
"We're through the looking glass here people!"
by LOUtheMETandNATSfan on Jun 21, 2010 12:29 PM EDT reply actions
The umpires have a pretty strong union too.
That’s why it’s not so easy to dump the bad ones.
If the tech exists for computer called balls and strikes, then freaking do it.
If the video exists to call check swing strikes…at least give the manager the power to challenge a call once or twice a game. If Riggles had a challenge, Berkmann would have struck out and that Astros game ends.
Human element is nice? That’s an argument from a long time ago when there weren’t better options. The only question is where to draw the line.
Every single game is on tv and MLB owns the rights…have a guy or two sitting in the home office in NY and when a call gets challenged, let him look. How tough is it? Not like there would be 15 challenges all at once. Most of these “challenges” are easy to see and if it’s too close to call, stick with the call on the field.
I'll do some research on this next weekend.
I originally wrote this because I was so discouraged with the game on Saturday. I felt we all got cheated by one guy doing his own thing.
Relax, all right? Don't try to strike everybody out. Strikeouts are boring! Besides that, they're fascist. Throw some ground balls - it's more democratic.
I would not mind
technology similar to tennis, where a ball that sails over the black would generate an audible beep (audible to the home plate umpire, the batter, and catcher at least.) The umpire would still be responsible for high and low calls, and he would still call the balls outside or inside the zone horizontally if they miss the black. This would drastically reduce the error rate, which, by the way, I don’t think is so bad that it needs to be addressed immediately for the sake of the game or anything.
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
I even disagree with that. MLB needs to set a strike zone and hold all the umpires responsible for calling it...
Have more oversight…and punish the umpires who suck. Next time the CBA comes up with the umpire union, MLB needs to make some huge demands.
right, its not changing any rules
MLB has set a strike zone, they just need to hold the umps responsible. no where in the rules is there anything about “in the officials opinion/judgement” ar anything remoteley like that. If I’m the batter and I’m out on a pitch that technology says is in the zone but the ump might not have, I’m not going to argue that.
The strike zone...
A STRIKE is a legal pitch when so called by the umpire, which —
(a) Is struck at by the batter and is missed;
(b) Is not struck at, if any part of the ball passes through any part of the strike zone;
© Is fouled by the batter when he has less than two strikes;
(d) Is bunted foul;
(e) Touches the batter as he strikes at it;
(f) Touches the batter in flight in the strike zone; or
(g) Becomes a foul tip.
The STRIKE ZONE is that area over home plate the upper limit of which is a horizontal line at the midpoint between the top of the shoulders and the top of the uniform pants, and the lower level is a line at the hollow beneath the knee cap. The Strike Zone shall be determined from the batter’s stance as the batter is prepared to swing at a pitched ball.
Roscoe you're absolutely right, just make the Bozos who are supposed to
enforce the rules of MLB during the game adhere to them. Start removing umpires who sip. Call it the Joe West Rule. If you suck as bad as Joe West, you should be relieved of your duties as an umpire, no exceptions.
Patiently waiting for "next year" since 1971.
by Princess Jazzy on Jun 21, 2010 3:55 PM EDT up reply actions
I don't even mind if MLB redefines the strike zone...
They get the low part right…but the top of most strike zones appears to be the belt…not halfway between the belt and the top of the shoulders.
The thing is, MLB has allowed umpires to suck.
What has happened to the Doug Harvey’s of the game? My husband’s theory is that the quality of major league umpiring declined the minute Wendlestat started an “Academy” and MLB started recruiting from there.
Today’s umpires are a mere shadow of their predecessors. Unfortunately, MLB hasn’t dealt with them correctly and imposed penalties for guys like Country Joe and Angel Hernandez. They should be fined and reprimanded just like players and managers are. Good umpiring should be rewarded, bad umpiring should be discouraged.
Patiently waiting for "next year" since 1971.
by Princess Jazzy on Jun 21, 2010 4:05 PM EDT up reply actions
Not true.
Umpires are promoted based upon performance.
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
So, when can we see an umpire demoted?
They want press? They want to make a show? Let’s hear when they get fined and demoted.
Yeah, I want to see them held accountable immediately
for their suckitude.
After that Astros game, the league should have reviewed the tape and issued a fine on the home plate umpire. Lists of fines should be published daily.
If an umpire collects X fines in Y period, he should be suspended WITHOUT PAY for Z period.
More than X + fines in a season should prevent an umpire from working in the majors again until he’s fully re-certified.
If the umpires want to keep the human factor, they need to be better at doing thier jobs.
Statistics are like bikinis. What they reveal is suggestive, but what they conceal is vital.
Aaron Levenstein
+1
You’re an umpire, not a Supreme Court Judge. Create accountability, systems for improvement, and systems of removal for when Heave Ho Joe goes off the reservation.
Cool Hand Lannan has carried the mail in anonymity for two years. He'll carry the mail for at least two more! Give the man some defense and he'll give you the world. MOAR GROUNDERZ! MOAR DOUBLE PLAYZ!
It's the year of the pitcher.
bigger strike zones all around baseball. Zim and Dunn better adjust.
Your voice of doom and gloom. Read more at natsnewsnetwork.blogspot.com
by Dave at District Sports Page on Jun 21, 2010 2:54 PM EDT reply actions
What are you talking about?
For the vast majority of the time, they HAVE adjusted! Haven’t you been privy to all the discussion about the Nats having the best 3-4-5 combo in the league?
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
Sorry, guys, anything other than a human being calling balls/strikes is not Baseball.
Getting rid of the human factor in calling balls and strikes is as bad as the DH which should have never been allowed because it isn’t Baseball either. It’s like giving the game “4” outs instead of “3” per inning. You can do that if you want, but don’t call it Baseball, you have to call it something else.
Patiently waiting for "next year" since 1971.
If that's the case, do you approve of holding umpires accountable and having more punishments when they fail?
If they want to be such a big part of the game, they need to pay a price when they affect the outcome of the game. I think they have the ability to learn the strike zone and call pitches, but they refuse to do it.
Absolutely, I just posted that in reply to your excellent posts up above.
Patiently waiting for "next year" since 1971.
by Princess Jazzy on Jun 21, 2010 3:59 PM EDT up reply actions
My call for electronic balls and strikes is out of frustration with the failures of umpires.
I think with ramifications and public humiliation (suspensions/fines/MLB home office press releases) these jokers could improve.
If an official source said…Berkman should have been called out…it carries more weight with me and I think the umpire would care more that he lost a game for a certain team because he failed at his job.
I like that the NFL will occasionally public admit refereeing mistakes.
Cool Hand Lannan has carried the mail in anonymity for two years. He'll carry the mail for at least two more! Give the man some defense and he'll give you the world. MOAR GROUNDERZ! MOAR DOUBLE PLAYZ!
What exactly are you advocating here?
I hear/see this term “holding umpires accountable” a lot, but I’m not sure what people want. First of all, umpires are held accountable in some sense. The league knows who does well and who doesn’t, but they handle their own personnel decisions internally. Perhaps that’s what gets people’s goad. No, umpires are publicly called out, shackled, beaten, or shot. They are, however, picked for promotion and/or appearances in the post-season based upon their performance.
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
I'm advocating every umpire calling the strike zone as defined in the MLB rulebook.
DId you see Jim Joyce after he blew a call that cost a perfect game? He admitted he was wrong. It would be nice if others would comment on the record.
Yep. If they all admitted to being human that would go a long way.
If you want to be invincible robots, then we’ve got better invincible robots to replace you. But if you want to be human beings, there should be systems to help hold those human being accountable and systems to send poorer performing umps down when their performance sinks according to objective measures.
Cool Hand Lannan has carried the mail in anonymity for two years. He'll carry the mail for at least two more! Give the man some defense and he'll give you the world. MOAR GROUNDERZ! MOAR DOUBLE PLAYZ!
I need to look at the history of the DH rule.
I don’t like the DH, but I’m interested in the process by which it was instituted.
Cool Hand Lannan has carried the mail in anonymity for two years. He'll carry the mail for at least two more! Give the man some defense and he'll give you the world. MOAR GROUNDERZ! MOAR DOUBLE PLAYZ!
Sure, but what's the problem?
Is it balls and strikes? Is it calls at first-base? Is it checked swings?
Umpires have worked ok for 100 years. Let’s calm down a little before taking drastic measures. I’m fine with more accountability. How about trying that first?
I'm for keeping human umps,
but i wouldn’t mind setting up a sort of Skinner Box where by if the ump didn’t get the call correct he would receive a mild electric shock.
Funny, I was just about to write the same thing!
And for every sequential call he got wrong in a game, the voltage would go UP! Cowboy Joe West would be doing a mighty fine crab dance out there.
Heh.
Or, perhaps, a prong collar…every time the umpire made the wrong call, he’d get a yank on the prong collar. It doesn’t hurt, just reminds him to PAY BETTER ATTENTION!
Statistics are like bikinis. What they reveal is suggestive, but what they conceal is vital.
Aaron Levenstein
I fully support this idea. Electric shock or a prong collar. Works for me.
Patiently waiting for "next year" since 1971.
by Princess Jazzy on Jun 21, 2010 4:41 PM EDT up reply actions
We dog people know about training!
Never used electric collars but have thought longingly of using one of unattended, super barky dogs!
Statistics are like bikinis. What they reveal is suggestive, but what they conceal is vital.
Aaron Levenstein
Never have either, but with my two barkers I dream about it a lot! LOL
Patiently waiting for "next year" since 1971.
by Princess Jazzy on Jun 21, 2010 4:45 PM EDT up reply actions
+1 for electronic shock therapy
Relax, all right? Don't try to strike everybody out. Strikeouts are boring! Besides that, they're fascist. Throw some ground balls - it's more democratic.
The Problem I have with Pitch F/X
Is that, as portrayed, it doesn’t do a very good job of portraying the 3-D strike zone. Where is the inside/outside marked? At the front of the plate? The back of the plate? Same for height – if a knuckler, for example, or Livo’s SLOOOOW curve is knee high at the front of the plate it may well be barely off the ground by the time the catcher catches it.
Until someone can satisfactorily develop a technology that addresses all of these concerns, leave in the umps. Having seen instant replay in the NFL, I know it’s not a panacea even on calls that should be obvious!
Pitch F/X is one thing...
if they wanted to really track balls and strikes, some egghead could come up with the plans for a system in about a half hour.
It probably already exists...and could be repurposed easily for baseball.
Statistics are like bikinis. What they reveal is suggestive, but what they conceal is vital.
Aaron Levenstein
No! No! No! That's not Baseball.
I’m a purist, what can I say? Baseball is a pure game, no buzzers or clocks and that is the way it should be.
I’m kind of torn on the Instant Replay stuff because there have been such bad calls lately but I think that speaks more to changing the system of internally “handling” umpire issues. I think they need to be made public like someone suggested above. If fans saw that MLB was actually trying to enforce the rules correctly and would reprimand those that don’t, it would weed out suckitude eventually.
Patiently waiting for "next year" since 1971.
by Princess Jazzy on Jun 21, 2010 4:44 PM EDT up reply actions
Bit of an over-exaggeration there
Major league pitches don’t break THAT MUCH during the time they pass from the from of the plate to the back.
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
But they don't fly in a straight line, either.
And it’s more important for “back door” breaking pitches, the slider or cutter that aims at one of the back corners of the plate and not the front corner. To say not “THAT MUCH” ignores the fact that we’re often looking at very fine distinctions.
And the one thing that we do know is that offset cameras create false perspectives.
You're right about the cameras, umpires gripe about them.
They have a right to complain, but it doesn’t give them the right to have a strike zone the size of a postage stamp or the grand canyon. Consistency would be appreciated.
Patiently waiting for "next year" since 1971.
by Princess Jazzy on Jun 21, 2010 5:18 PM EDT up reply actions
No, really
A pitch breaks at most 8-10 inches horizontally. Even if the entire break only took place in the last 1/3 of the way to home plate, that’s still less than a half-inch break from the front of the plate to the back. Pitchers are nowhere near so precise at to put the pitch just a half inch off the front of the plate with the idea that it will skirt the back edge of the black.
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
The total amount of break is utterly irrelevant
It’s where the pitch starts and ends up that helps determine whether it crosses the plate. For example, if you have a sidearm LOOGY throwing a slider from the first base side of the rubber, at the release point of the pitch the ball is practically looking at the side of the plate as much the front. Where is F/X looking at the ball? At the front of the plate, the ball may be a couple/three inches off the plate and still hit the back right corner.
It's just math, man.
Let’s say a pitcher is somehow able to throw from four feet to the left of the rubber and it heads straight towards (the back of) the plate. That means it has to reduce the offset by 1 foot for every 15 feet traveled forward, or just over a half-inch during the time it takes to go from the front corner of the plate to the back corner.
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
In other words,
If they guy is able to throw his pitch from 16 to 20 feet to the left of the rubber, then we can start talking about pitches 2-3 inches off the plate at the front crossing the plate at the back.
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
I acknowledge the math, but stand by my point
Until I know the mechanics of how the f/x pitch location box is produced I’m not terribly inclined to believe it’s much better than umpires. Remember Questec? It was hugely popular, and MLB invested a lot of money and time into the system for grading umpires. Then they discovered that it was not being uniformly applied, and that there was still human judgment calls as part of the system.
Look, I pitch – if you think ML umpires are a problem, try rec league umpires! But if we’re going to replace umpires on ball/strike calls, you have to convince me that the results are actually better as opposed to merely different. Give me a three-dimensional zone to throw at, solve the problem of different batter heights to worry about, figure out a way to keep teams from meddling with their home plate and with the software (if you thought groundskeeping was an art form, just you wait), and now we’re talking. I keep hearing “it ought to be possible.” Well, a lot of things “ought to be possible” that aren’t. Show me the method. A box with dots on the web page isn’t convincing until I know the method that produced the data.. Otherwise it’s just garbage in, garbage out.
The pitch location is computed by triangulating the tracked ball trajectory from fixed cameras
The x and z coordinates are computed from the intersection of the trajectories at the front of the plate. People have been using this technology for several decades now for civil engineering, military applications, and even assembly line quality assurance. It was bleeding edge in the late 80’s early 90s. The “virtual” first down stripes you see on football broadcasts are derived from the same photogrametric technology.
Relax, all right? Don't try to strike everybody out. Strikeouts are boring! Besides that, they're fascist. Throw some ground balls - it's more democratic.
You mean those lines aren't real???!!!
Rob
"No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball."
—Connie Mack
RobBobS, I assume you mean pitches other those throw by Stephan Strasburg, whose curve actually arrives at the front of the plate and then drops at either a 45 degree or a 60 degree angle, depending on how he clips his nails that day or between innings.
(Bet you all thought we could get through an entire discussion without dropping the S bomb.)
Pitch F/X is front of plate
Relax, all right? Don't try to strike everybody out. Strikeouts are boring! Besides that, they're fascist. Throw some ground balls - it's more democratic.
I only have one thing to say:
"We're through the looking glass here people!"
by LOUtheMETandNATSfan on Jun 21, 2010 10:44 PM EDT reply actions
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