When ABS Costs You a Game

The Cardinal Chronicle
When ABS Costs You a Game
St. Louis, MO
By Ray Mileur

Bottom of the ninth. Tie game. Full count.

The pitch comes in — riding the edge, just above the knees. The catcher receives it clean. The umpire calls ball four.

The runner takes first.

And then, almost as an afterthought, the catcher taps his helmet.

Challenge.

Everything stops.

The crowd doesn’t cheer. It doesn’t boo. It waits.

A few seconds later, the call is overturned.

Strike three.

Inning over.

And just like that, the moment changes — not because of what happened on the field, but because of what happened after it.

This is the reality of the Automated Ball-Strike system.

It doesn’t just correct missed calls — it has the power to rewrite moments.

That pitch didn’t suddenly get better. The hitter didn’t suddenly get worse. The pitcher didn’t execute any differently.

But the outcome changed.

And in a game built on rhythm, that matters.

Let’s be clear about what we’re seeing.

These aren’t blown calls being overturned.

These are borderline pitches — the kind that have always lived in the gray area of baseball. A ball that clips the zone by a fraction. A pitch that depends on how a hitter’s height is measured that day. A fastball at the letters that one umpire might call and another might not.

That gray area isn’t a flaw in the game.

It is the game.

And now, we’re reviewing it like it’s a mistake.

ABS was introduced to remove pressure from umpires.

Instead, it’s shifted that pressure to the players.

Now it’s the catcher, the hitter, or the pitcher who has to decide — instantly — whether to challenge.

No replay room. No slow motion. No second look.

Just instinct.

And when that instinct is wrong?

You don’t get it back.

That’s not less pressure.

That’s different pressure.

Baseball has always had a strike zone that breathes.

Great pitchers knew how to work the edges.
Great hitters knew how to protect against it.
Great umpires knew how to manage it.

It wasn’t perfect.

But it was understood.

Now, we’re replacing that understanding with precision and precision comes at a cost.

Because the more exact you make something, the less room there is for feel.

And baseball has never been a game played by numbers alone.

Here’s the part that matters.

Nobody is going to remember the percentage of correct calls.

Nobody is going to remember the accuracy of the system.

They’re going to remember the moment.

The walk that wasn’t a walk.
The strikeout that wasn’t a strikeout.
The inning that should have continued — and didn’t.

And sooner or later, a team is going to walk off the field knowing the biggest moment of the game wasn’t decided by a pitch, but by a challenge.

 
Begging The Question

ABS may make the game more accurate, but does it make it better?

That’s not a question you answer in March.

That’s a question you answer the first time it costs someone a game.

And that day is coming.