Home plate umpire Ryan Blakney seemed to be in his feels after Brett Baty didn’t appear to like a call that ended the fourth inning.
The Mets’ third baseman was called out on strikes on a pitch that caught the bottom of the strike zone and tossed his bat in frustration as he walked out of the batter’s box.
After he took off his batting gloves and helmet, Batty looked back in the direction of the plate and appeared to shake his head, prompting the umpire to shout at Baty.
That comment prompted Baty to turn and tell Blakney that “I didn’t say anything to you,” which would appear to be supported by the mics that picked up the sequence of events.
Blakney then shouted back to Baty, “you didn’t need to.”
“Don’t look at me,” the testy ump barked back at Baty.
Baty repeated that he didn’t say anything to the umpire and added that it was the umpire who instigated the situation, which Blakney denied despite the fact that the mics picked up him being the first person to say something after the strikeout call.
Eventually, Mets third base coach Tim Leiper moved Baty away from the area and back into the field for the start of the fifth inning.
It was certainly an odd moment for Blakney to instigate the argument, though he could have been frustrated after three of his calls were challenged in the first inning alone, including the first pitch of the bottom of the first. Two were overturned.
The introduction of the automated ball-strike system has largely been praised since MLB instituted it during this year’s regular season, but it has also led to some embarrassing moments for MLB umpires.
C.B. Bucknor has found himself on the wrong end of a number of challenges, and on Saturday, he had six of eight calls that had been challenged by players overturned.
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In an article published last month by the Associated Press, former major league umpire Richie Garcia complained that it was “embarrassing to the umpires that are calling the game.”
“Nobody likes to be humiliated in front of 30,000, 40,000 people,” he said. “What Major League Baseball is saying is: I don’t trust the umpire’s strike zone, so I’m going to use something that’s going to be operated by some computer geek that knows nothing about baseball, and he’s the one that’s going to measure this and measure that because he’s got a Ph.D. in physics or whatever the hell he’s got a degree in.”
