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Why is baseball the worst officiated sport?

Fijimn

HB Legend
May 7, 2008
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This guy behind the plate at the Astros v. Yankees is horrendous. The strike zone moves all over the place. He's also the guy that called out McCutchen for running out of the base line when he actually ran straight. It's the easiest sport to call....there are a ton of umpires on the field of play and they regularly miss calls....just get rid of them can have robots call it.
 
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Not worse than NBA officiating.
Basketball is terribly difficult to call. These guys run and move all over the place. Same for football. Baseball has none of that. The home plate umpire has the most difficult job only because he’s involved in every pitch. But all he has to do is just set his zone and be consistent. Even if the zone is an inch outside the plate the players will adapt
 
This guy behind the plate at the Astros v. Yankees is horrendous. The strike zone moves all over the place. He's also the guy that called out McCutchen for running out of the base line when he actually ran straight. It's the easiest sport to call....there are a ton of umpires on the field of play and they regularly miss calls....just get rid of them can have robots call it.
Manfred sticking it to the Astros again. The umpiring (Angel Hernandez, Joe West, CJ Bucknor, etc.) keeps getting worse each year.
 
I'd say MLB umpiring is ridiculously good. It's amazing to me how accurate those guys are.

They actually aren't that great. 12% overall error rate on balls and strikes...29% when a batter has two strikes. And the veteran umps tend to be the bigger problem.

 
Good. Screw those cheaters. They didn't get really any significant punishment otherwise. I hope Joe and Angel call every game for them.
That is brilliant. One of them has to be behind the plate every game. The Stros will be crying no mas by the end of the year.
 
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I think the biggest problem is that one ump controls too much of the game.

In football, any ref can call a penalty and they all have their jobs. Same for basketball. Control of the game is spread out fairly evenly so that one ref having a bad game isn’t as noticeable unless they are really bad like happens in Big Ten basketball.

In baseball, only one guy calls balls and strikes every pitch. He has too much control and it is easily noticeable if he sucks all game long. The other umps in the game aren’t all that important in the grand scheme of things. Their jobs are the easiest officiating jobs in all of sport, with the first base ump being a bit harder than the other two spots.

What is amazing is that we don’t hear much about hockey officiating. Those players are moving with insane speed and the puck can travel faster than a pitched ball. Yet those guys keep up. I wonder if it is because they have to be in great shape to do the job since they’re out there skating around on the ice and having to avoid getting destroyed by a slap shot or player skating backwards,
 
I think the biggest problem is that one ump controls too much of the game.

In football, any ref can call a penalty and they all have their jobs. Same for basketball. Control of the game is spread out fairly evenly so that one ref having a bad game isn’t as noticeable unless they are really bad like happens in Big Ten basketball.

In baseball, only one guy calls balls and strikes every pitch. He has too much control and it is easily noticeable if he sucks all game long. The other umps in the game aren’t all that important in the grand scheme of things. Their jobs are the easiest officiating jobs in all of sport, with the first base ump being a bit harder than the other two spots.

What is amazing is that we don’t hear much about hockey officiating. Those players are moving with insane speed and the puck can travel faster than a pitched ball. Yet those guys keep up. I wonder if it is because they have to be in great shape to do the job since they’re out there skating around on the ice and having to avoid getting destroyed by a slap shot or player skating backwards,
I am sure if you lived in Canada you would. 95% Americans don’t care enough about hockey to know the refs.
 
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I think the biggest problem is that one ump controls too much of the game.

In football, any ref can call a penalty and they all have their jobs. Same for basketball. Control of the game is spread out fairly evenly so that one ref having a bad game isn’t as noticeable unless they are really bad like happens in Big Ten basketball.

In baseball, only one guy calls balls and strikes every pitch. He has too much control and it is easily noticeable if he sucks all game long. The other umps in the game aren’t all that important in the grand scheme of things. Their jobs are the easiest officiating jobs in all of sport, with the first base ump being a bit harder than the other two spots.

What is amazing is that we don’t hear much about hockey officiating. Those players are moving with insane speed and the puck can travel faster than a pitched ball. Yet those guys keep up. I wonder if it is because they have to be in great shape to do the job since they’re out there skating around on the ice and having to avoid getting destroyed by a slap shot or player skating backwards,

I know very little about hockey.... but from what I’ve seen in video games and movies is there’s only like 5 scenarios where hockey officials have to do anything. They also don’t have any responsibility for goals.
 
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I would argue international soccer is worse (or at least CONCACAF) and it’s much more detrimental to the product. Watching a US team that only gets 5-10 goal scoring opportunities a game and have the refs take away just 1 is awful.

(Of course.... it would be less noticeable if the team was better)
 
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I know very little about hockey.... but from what I’ve seen in video games and movies is there’s only like 5 scenarios where hockey officials have to do anything. They also don’t have any responsibility for goals.

So you've watch 6 minutes of hockey
 
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They actually aren't that great. 12% overall error rate on balls and strikes...29% when a batter has two strikes. And the veteran umps tend to be the bigger problem.


Interesting but I don't buy it. Not even close. Over a fourth of calls with 2 strikes are wrong? No way.
 
Interesting but I don't buy it. Not even close. Over a fourth of calls with 2 strikes are wrong? No way.

I'm shocked the number is that low. Umps are horrible at calling balls and strikes.

And this is based on 10 years (2008-2018) of comparing actual calls to MLB's own Pitch f/x and Stat cast, which are both FAR more accurate than umpires at calling balls and strikes.

We are at least 10 years past the point where humans shouldn't be calling balls and strikes for MLB.
 
I'm shocked the number is that low. Umps are horrible at calling balls and strikes.

And this is based on 10 years (2008-2018) of comparing actual calls to MLB's own Pitch f/x and Stat cast, which are both FAR more accurate than umpires at calling balls and strikes.

We are at least 10 years past the point where humans shouldn't be calling balls and strikes for MLB.
This is just so wrong it can’t even be defended. If MLB had a system that was more accurate, they would be using it and they wouldn’t have just dumped their previous system to try something else this year. Go search some of the videos from robo ump in the Atlantic league. Also the numbers MLB publishes to the public is not what is provided to the umpires as their score. Remember Manfred was MLB’s legal counsel during the last labor dispute with the umpires. Are the umps perfect behind the plate, no but they are greater than 95% on called pitches.
 
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This guy behind the plate at the Astros v. Yankees is horrendous. The strike zone moves all over the place. He's also the guy that called out McCutchen for running out of the base line when he actually ran straight. It's the easiest sport to call....there are a ton of umpires on the field of play and they regularly miss calls....just get rid of them can have robots call it.
Because athletes don't move at 96 mph?
 
This is just so wrong it can’t even be defended. If MLB had a system that was more accurate, they would be using it and they wouldn’t have just dumped their previous system to try something else this year. Go search some of the videos from robo ump in the Atlantic league. Also the numbers MLB publishes to the public is not what is provided to the umpires as their score. Remember Manfred was MLB’s legal counsel during the last labor dispute with the umpires. Are the umps perfect behind the plate, no but they are greater than 95% on called pitches.

Actually, they aren't "better than 95% on called pitches" and the facts prove it.

And they have a system that is significantly better that they don't use. And it can't be defended or argued with facts.
 
The biggest difference is that you have a minute between each event in a baseball game to review the previous call and talk about it, run it in slow motion, freeze frame, ponder it, and come to a conclusion as to how bad the call was prior to the next pitch. In football and basketball, the game just moves on and there's no time to reflect.
 
People who watch basketball know this. Yet it's always people who don't watch basketball (especially tbe NBA) that comment on it, showing their stupidity.

Yep.

And that's not to defend the NBA refs, because they aren't perfect and have some mind-blowingly bad and missed calls. That should explain just how bad reffing is in college.

The on court product in the NBA is so much better that CBB it's incredible. A big part of that is the talent and athleticism. But the reffing has a significant role in that product. When you enforce the rules, but don't get in the way of the game, it results in a better game.
 
The biggest difference is that you have a minute between each event in a baseball game to review the previous call and talk about it, run it in slow motion, freeze frame, ponder it, and come to a conclusion as to how bad the call was prior to the next pitch. In football and basketball, the game just moves on and there's no time to reflect.

Which is why, if implemented properly, they could go to almost full automatic review and barely interrupt the game.
 
Yep.

And that's not to defend the NBA refs, because they aren't perfect and have some mind-blowingly bad and missed calls. That should explain just how bad reffing is in college.

The on court product in the NBA is so much better that CBB it's incredible. A big part of that is the talent and athleticism. But the reffing has a significant role in that product. When you enforce the rules, but don't get in the way of the game, it results in a better game.
I would argue there's a bigger difference between college refs & NBA refs than college players/NBA players. Austin Ash is closer in talent with Brad Beal than Bo Borowski is with James Capers.

College refs default to blowing the whistle, even if they didn't see the play. The opposite goes for NBA refs.
 
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Doesn't really matter because baseball has always been an outlier in many ways,.. One of the few sports where the dimensions and physical characteristics of the field of play vary from park to park,.. It's a throwback sport and that's one of the things people love about it...
 
2006 Outback Bowl
2021 NFCC and Super Bowl
2005 Iowa vs Michigan (I think that was the Witvoet one)
 
I would argue international soccer is worse (or at least CONCACAF) and it’s much more detrimental to the product. Watching a US team that only gets 5-10 goal scoring opportunities a game and have the refs take away just 1 is awful.

(Of course.... it would be less noticeable if the team was better)

Luckily they're finally using VAR, which single handedly would have gotten the US to the last WC (theoretically, I'm sure Honduras would have been happy to let in another late on). If you've been following this a long time, you'll probably remember the US playing at Saprissa in 2000, where it was made completely obvious to me as a youngster that things were openly rigged in broad daylight. I really had no idea that a professional sport could be that shamelessly corrupt.
 
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