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Here's what drives me crazy about baseball.

Posted by David (aka David) Oct 8 '15, 07:02

They inexplicably add a single-game elimination, and it happens to pit a 98-win team against a 97-win team.

They refuse to let a computer call balls and strikes, because they're not at all concerned with accuracy.

There's a 3-2 pitch with two outs and a runner on first. The pitcher throws a ball that's clearly outside. The pitch tracker shows it missed the plate by about eight inches.

There should be runners on first and second with two outs.

The umpire blows the call, and the hitter strikes out looking. The inning ends, and there's nothing the losing team can do about it.

Does the call impact the game? We'll never know. Jake Arrieta was dealing, but a bloop hit or a hanging curveball fundamentally changes the situation.

Is everything about the situation wrong? Absolutely. A 98-win team goes home for losing one playoff game where the umps blew a key call.

Responses:

And it only matters in game 163? Just for sake of argument, you have possibly 16k pitches per team leading up to this moment - oblique Oct 8, 07:15 13
- I mean, the plate is defined to exacting dimensions, and that's used to call B&S. Why make it fuzzy after going to that trouble? -- nm - Reagen Oct 8, 08:21
- No, it matters in all 163. That's why computers should call balls and strikes. -- nm - David Oct 8, 07:16 11
  - I think they will sooner, rather than later, but we're still on the cutting edge of it being possible. It'll take a little while to figure out how to do it. *NM* - Ender Oct 8, 07:31
  - I don't like the absoluteness of it. It seems too mechanical. I know that sounds strange but to me it's part of baseball -- nm - oblique Oct 8, 07:20 9
    - I don't see what the problem is, they've been doing it in tennis for years. -- nm - Martina Navratilova Oct 8, 07:46
    - I used to agree with this, but it's gotten so bad and umpires are so bad at this I can't argue on this side anymore. - Jim Oct 8, 07:23 6
      - How much of that is bias *because* you have something supposedly showing you what a ball/strike is? It seems SO bad because there's a line drawn by a - oblique Oct 8, 07:25 5
        
        I'd agree that it hasn't really gotten worse, we're just in a much better position to recognize it. - Ender Oct 8, 07:33
        
        In some cases, really bad. Again, the better pitchers get the calls. Catchers who are better at framing pitches get the calls. - Jim Oct 8, 07:28 2
        
        And that's been recognized since the days of Walter Johnson. -- nm - Reagen Oct 8, 08:19 1
        
        ....and and Honus Wagner, Cap Anson and Mordecai "Three-Finger" Brown -- nm - prayformojo Oct 8, 08:23
        
        It was awful long before pitch tracker. - David Oct 8, 07:27
    - REAGEN!!! -- nm - David Oct 8, 07:22
[deleted] 1
- I thought McCann was going to kill that home plate ump. -- nm - David Oct 8, 07:11
Yet another reason to never have one game decide a "series". No team plays just one game against another the entire season but - Krusty Oct 8, 07:08 22
- It's not about determining who's better. it's about determining that the #1 seed should have an advantage over the team they were better than all yea - Will Hunting Oct 8, 07:12 12
  - Re-seeding based on record instead of division is something all sports need to do. -- nm - David Oct 8, 07:14 1
    - I would go as far as putting the WC team as either seed #3 or 4 depending on where they fall...but I can't give them homefield. - Will Hunting Oct 8, 07:17
  - [deleted] 9
    - And here's the argument for re-seeding in the playoffs...which I happen to agree with. -- nm - Jim Oct 8, 07:15 8
      - Which makes the divisions meaningless. Not sure I'm okay with that either. I know I'm not okay with a one game playoff. -- nm - Krusty Oct 8, 07:17 7
        
        [deleted]
        
        Dodgers: 92 wins. Mets: 90 wins. Pirates: 98 wins. The Mets and Dodgers get to lose three (or four) times as much before being eliminated. - David Oct 8, 07:18 5
        
        Yes but they play an unbalanced schedule with more games against your division. They need to have a balanced schedule with equal teams in each league. - Krusty Oct 8, 07:23 4
        
        Only 7 NL teams won 83+ games this season. So, the balance isn't there across the league. -- nm - David Oct 8, 07:26
        
        This year even flies in the face of that as the Pirates and Cubs are in the best division...so - Jim Oct 8, 07:25 2
        
        Yeah, I would expect the Mets or Dodgers to run up a huge total given how awful the bottom of their divisions were. - Will Hunting Oct 8, 07:41
        
        It's just one year. I would need to see the numbers from multiple years to see if it does matter. - Krusty Oct 8, 07:29
- I'm still livid about that infield fly bullshit against Atlanta in 2012. -- (link) - David Oct 8, 07:09 8
  - What in the goddamned hell? -- nm - Reagen Oct 8, 08:18
  - I think we all need to stop dwelling on the past here and should really be focused on the future. :) -- nm - Jim Oct 8, 07:56
  - wow -- nm - psilotum Oct 8, 07:39
  - [deleted]
  - See? That one was just good solid quality umpiring. nm - Jim Oct 8, 07:13 3
    - I'll just root for the Cubbies. -- nm - David Oct 8, 07:15 2
      - Oooh, how many hours will YOU get for that though? :) -- nm - Jim Oct 8, 07:16 1
        
        Like she could ever stay mad at me. -- nm - David Oct 8, 07:17
There are people, I kid you not, who think umpire mistakes *add* to the appeal of baseball. - Reagen Oct 8, 07:06 3
- It'd be like playing 21 and not knowing whether your ace counts as one or eleven until a coin is flipped. -- nm - David Oct 8, 07:07
- drug test the Umps! -- nm - Beaker Oct 8, 07:06 1
  - See if they have Fan Duel accounts -- nm - Bacon Oct 8, 07:08
It's maddening. Especially when you consider that there's a way to fix it that won't impeded the game. - Jim Oct 8, 07:05 3
- It would actually speed up the game. Managers can't argue with computers. -- nm - David Oct 8, 07:06 2
  - Further, it would get rid of the whole "he's a Cy Young candidate, so we'll give him the call" bullshit. - Jim Oct 8, 07:07 1
    - Even as a Greg Maddux/Tom Glavine superfan, I agree. - David Oct 8, 07:08

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Here's what drives me crazy about baseball.

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