It was a tough week for umpires across the major leagues.
Over the course of just a few days, the men in blue were under heavy scrutiny for an array of missed homerun calls, once again prompting the debate to adopt instant replay into baseball.
Front and centre was Bob Davidson, whose expletive-filled apology to reporters over his blown call (reversing a call on a HR by the Mets' Carlos Delgado that clearly hit the foul pole) I found to be quite refreshing. I'm actually surprised more umpires in the heat of the moment don¹t call balls "foul" that hit the "foul" pole. I mean it was bound to happen sometime, right?
But to Bob's credit, he took it like a man and admitted his (expletive) guilt. Fair to say he was in a foul mood. Still, how often do you actually hear of an umpire these days admitting he's wrong? How about ... never!
Not helping the umps cause though were two more blown homerun calls to the Cubs' Geovany Soto and A-Rod later in the week. When it rains it pours, I guess. So now the GMs, media and baseball's critics have banded together, demanding that replay be instituted on controversial homerun calls, to save baseball from itself, and its umpires.
For starters, I¹m a baseball purist. I don't subscribe to the belief that just because the technology exists, it should be used. While most everyone can agree that the most important thing is to get the call on the field right, I'm not so sure in baseball¹s case, replay is the best way to do it.
The answer could be as simple as fixing the hypocrisy in baseball right now. During the regular season, there are four to every umpiring crew at each game. However, in the postseason, where every pitch and every call are deemed paramount, MLB expands their crews to six, situating an ump on both the right-field and left-field lines to assist with balls hit fair or foul and with homerun calls. If baseball was really serious about getting homerun calls right more consistently, shouldn't they add these umpires in the outfield for ALL regular season games? Personally, I think it's a little unfair and unrealistic to think that umpires should make a clear-cut call on a borderline homerun from 250+ feet away.
This would take adding approximately 30 more umpires to the union. Still, over the long run, I don't think it would cost much more then instituting video replay would. And for purists like me, it would maintain the human element in the game.
Plus, replay will cause further delays in games. Right now, baseball is doing everything in their power to speed up games, not slow them down. This very weekend marks the beginning of the (annual) crack down on slow play around the majors. Whether umps can actually make it stick this time around is another matter.
Unlike the NHL, NBA and NFL, the rules of baseball have remained mostly unchanged for the past 100 years. There is something to be said for preserving the purity of the game. Adding outfield umpires, not "coach's challenges" and video review, I think, is a much better way to go.