The Orioles were the latest victims of yet another automated ball-strike system snafu on Wednesday.
With two outs in the bottom of the second inning of their 8-5 loss to the Diamondbacks, Baltimore third baseman Coby Mayo took a 3-0 pitch from Arizona starter Eduardo Rodriguez near the outside corner that home plate umpire John Tumpane called a strike.
As Tumpane made the call, Mayo started his walk toward first, thinking the pitch from Rodriguez was off the outside of the plate.
Mayo then moved his hand towards his helmet as if he was going to challenge the pitch, but stopped short of touching the top of his head, seemingly halting himself from questioning the call.
Tumpane apparently saw otherwise, forcing Mayo to go through with the challenge despite not touching his helmet, and Mayo arguing he didn’t actually give the signal to go through with it.
Coby Mayo appeared to think about challenging the 3-0 call, but didn’t quite tap the top of his helmet. Jomboy Media/X The pitch would be confirmed as a strike, taking away an Orioles challenge and moving the count to 3-1.
Losing the challenge aside, it would work out for Mayo, who hit a double on the next pitch, but the ordeal is the latest example of MLB’s growing pains with ABS.
Home plate umpire John Tumpane made Coby Mayo go through with a challenge he didn’t exactly want to use. Jomboy Media/X Last week, the Pirates’ Nick Gonzales unsuccessfully attempted to un-challenge a pitch after clearly tapping his helmet on a strike call.
Red Sox infielder Andruw Monasterio made perhaps the worst ABS decision of the year on Tuesday, challenging an 88 mph slider right down the middle from Mick Abel for a strikeout.
As expected, some teams have had more success than others with the new system.
After a hot start at challenging calls, the Yankees have hit a cold stretch and now rank just 12th in the league at 57.1 percent.
