Replay in Baseball? Challenge Accepted!

Major League Baseball has officially entered the 21^st Century, and it’s about time. On January 16, 2014 every MLB team as well as the players association and the umpires union agreed to expanded replay. Prior to the new system teams could only ask for a video replay on homerun and boundary calls. Although many people believe these changes will improve the game, many baseball purists hate the idea and both sides have legitimate arguments.

The new system will allow managers one challenge per game and if that challenge overturns the call they will be awarded a second challenge. Along with homerun and boundary calls managers can now challenge ground rule double calls, outfield traps, fan interference, hit by pitch, tag plays and several other calls.

One interesting play notably left off the list is force plays at second base on a double play. For years second baseman and shortstops have used the “neighborhood tag” to their advantage in turning double plays. If you’re unfamiliar with the “neighborhood tag,” if a ball is grounded to the second baseman and he tosses it to the shortstop at second base the shortstop will very often never touch the base and still turn a double play. Umpires will call the player out the vast majority of times but occasionally players are called safe. The idea is to keep the fielder safe from runner’s metal cleats. It’s extremely intriguing the “neighborhood tag” is left off the list because of the many controversies it causes. But that is a discussion for another time.

Fans already groan at the length of a baseball game which was roughly two hours and 58 minutes last year. Adding replay will most definitely add time to games. Baseball has a difficult enough time keeping fans interested at the “slow pace” of play, how will adding time to games keep those fans entertained? It won’t.

Replay also takes away some of the good old fashioned rustic feel of the game. Of the four major sports; baseball, football, hockey and basketball, baseball is the only one that has no time limit. Fans will never hear a final buzzer go off. The game can go on and on until an outcome has been reached. The game has a natural, pastoral feel about it. It has wide open fields and the foul lines extend to foul poles that reach to the heavens. It’s a beautiful idea and feeling when you think of the history and the realness of what baseball is. And now MLB adds replay? A man-made machine that shows the umpire what just happened. What’s real about that? It takes away from the fantasy of baseball and the genuineness of the game.

On the other side, though, plenty of reasons exist why replay will help baseball. In today’s sports world the most important thing is to get the call right. A few years ago on June 2, 2010 Armando Galarraga lost a perfect game on a blown call at first base on what should have been the 27^th and final out. In the 2009 ALDS Joe Mauer hit a double down the left field line against the Yankees that could have sparked a rally in extra innings and the umpire called it foul, the ball was about a foot fair. Those are only two examples of the hundreds nay thousands of calls umpires get wrong. In fairness to the umps they are human and humans make mistakes. So baseball decided to fix many of those mistakes with replay.

Fixing calls isn’t the only thing replay does. Umpires now have a chance to be validated instead of demonized. Think about it, when an umpire makes a bad call fans, players, coaches and managers tear into that umpire. Now the umpire won’t have to deal with that scrutiny as the play can be fixed or the umpire can say, “I was right.” Umpires get more flack than anyone in baseball. When teams lose fans and players blame the umps. Now the scapegoat is gone. Now you can only blame the team.

No sport will get every call right or for that matter, every non-call right. But for the first time ever baseball is making huge strides in fixing a broken part of its game.

Welcome to the 21^st century baseball, we’ve been waiting for you.