Personally, I am against instant replay beyond what they currently have in place for home runs (over the line, fair or foul) if the system of review would be staying the same. Under the current system of "going under the hood," There is just too many ways the game can be brutally extended time wise. Would every close play at first be reviewed? Every trap by an outfielder? Only calls that a team complains about? It could be a real disaster.
There is one idea that would expand instant replay that I like (with some tweaking). Bloggin Bob Smizik mentioned it this morning. He wants to have a five man umpiring crew with one of the five in a video booth where he would have oversight in "extreme circumstances."
This might be what Bob means but I would make it just like the college football system (not coincidentally the most effective and least intrusive of the replay systems out there). The fifth umpire in the video booth is watching every play. If he sees something that is incorrect, he would notify the crew chief on field via some kind of phone/buzzer that the call should be changed. Most of the time that could be done without even stopping the game as replays come so fast and are usually pretty conclusive. In this system, the video review umpire would also have the ability to tell the field umps to stop the game if he needs time to look at multiple replays, but there would be a very short window to do that. Basically, if the video review umpire can't determine the right call in say 60 seconds, the call on the field stands. Managers would not be able to argue anything that is reviewed, nor ask for a review. The video review umpire has the final say and balls/strikes cannot be reviewed.
I have heard others suggest a NFL like challenge system where each manager gets a couple "red flags" per game. I don't like that one at all. It would end up being used as just another stall tactic by managers wanting to buy time for their bullpen for just mess with the other team/umpires (I can already picture Tony Larussa abusing his challenges). I hate the challenge system in the NFL. It should be like college football. Why should there be a limit on how many things can be reviewed if there are multiple bad calls?
My attitude is that if you are going to have instant replay it needs to be available for all calls while not slowing down the game at all. Other Thoughts?
I like it.
ReplyDeleteI would add that the nature of baseball makes it difficult to implement instant replay, because there is too much subjectivity in what happens or could have happened based solely on the call.
ReplyDeleteLet's say Andrew McCutchen makes a spectacular diving "trap" in the left-center field notch at PNC park that the umpire incorrectly rules as a catch. If this was reviewed and overturned, then what do you do with the batter? Put him on 2nd base? 3rd base? What if there were runners on base when the ball was hit?
On the other hand let's say he caught the ball and the ump ruled it a "trap". If this call is overturned, does McCutchen now get to throw out the runners who left base and scored? In baseball there is going to be more to every call than simply "out" or "safe".
Replays work a little better in football because there are certain events that immediately kill a play ("did the receiver step out of bounds?", "was the runner down before he fumbled the ball?", "did the ball cross the plane of the goal line?") and leave no question about the result. Baseball isn't like this.
I can live with the home run replay only because there is zero subjectivity in the result of the call (either way); it's either going to be a long strike or everybody scores. Other than that I can't think of many situations where the instant replay is even practical.