The year is 2021. Billionaires are currently having pissing contests to test the limits of space travel. The most basic of cell phones now have more computing power in them than the room sized supercomputers of past decades ever had. And 3D printers are so common that the average Joe can buy one for their house and have an Amazon drone drop it off on their doorstep if they so desire.
Yet for some reason, Major League Baseball is still calling balls and strikes the same way they did back in the 1890s. The technology has existed for decades now, this isn’t a recent development. But for reasons still unclear, whether it’s nostalgia, or simply the infuriating “that’s how it’s always been done” mentality that holds back organizations, MLB has refused to take the human element out of the strike zone.
As a reminder, this is the same league that has been trying desperately to find ways to speed up the game for years now. Why are things like “pitch clocks” and decreasing mound visits top of the list, yet the most obvious solution, a computerized strike zone (WHICH IS LITERALLY ON EVERY MLB BROADCAST) is a non-starter?
To be fair, Laz Diaz is merely a symptom of the larger issue at hand here. But his atrocious work behind home plate last night is the perfect example of why baseball needs to take a long hard look in the mirror. And this isn’t just a case of one missed call being blown out of proportion, he was terrible all night regardless of whether it was an Astros or Red Sox player at the plate:
Only moments later he would miss his 23rd ball/strike call of the evening…
The purists will say they like the human element of the game. Which is fine if there’s the odd error here or there. But when there are multiple errors that are easily correctable with technology, every inning, your argument that you’re looking out for the purity of the game goes out the window. Life probably was simpler when everyone drove horse drawn carriages around, but that doesn’t mean we should still be living like that.
Umpire unions would fight the change tooth and nail (as unions are ought to do) arguing that it would cost real life humans precious jobs. But the flaws in that argument are so glaringly obvious that it would take an organization like MLB who is so stuck in the past to overlook them.
Adding a computerized ball/strike system wouldn’t change the number of umpires on the field one iota. You’d still need a human behind home plate to call safe/out plays, and they could hold a hand held device (two buttons so as not to confuse the technologically adverse umpires union) with a ball/strike option as a fail safe should the technology aspect of the strike zone fail.
This would speed up the game, take all the arguing over strike zones out of play, and ensure consistency between pitchers & batters. What gets called a strike in the 3rd inning against the bottom of the order batter should still be a strike in the 7th inning against the team’s veteran clean up hitter. It doesn’t take an MIT engineer, or a Madison Ave. consultant to come up with this stuff. Your organization already has the tools and tech in place, just use it!
Every single team has advanced analytics departments where they’re pouring over thousands of data points on players and organizations all year long. All 30 teams have staffers with advanced mathematics degrees employed to make sense of all this data. We’re frankly at the point where advanced analytics dictate lineups more than managers do, so you can’t say that technology isn’t already having a massive impact on the game.
So why are you afraid of technology that has been in use since before the first iPod came out? There is no rational argument as to why something as black and white as ball or strike calls cannot be outsourced to a computer who will do a 100x times better job than it’s human counterpart could.
This isn’t figure skating or gymnastics where there are subjective categories like “artistic impression”. Did the ball pass through the strike zone, yes or no? It’s the most binary of decisions imaginable in all of sports. Let’s allow the technology to do its job and usher in a new era of baseball.
-Kyle Skinner
Twitter: @JKyleSkinner