Review exists solely for judgement calls.

True, but they have to be clearly missed judgment calls such as when an umpire judges the catcher tagged the runner before the runner touched home, and replays show the exact opposite.

The IFF call from last year's playoffs was not a missed judgment call. It was simply a call where different judgments may exist, such as on balls and strikes, checked swings, interference and obstruction. You can't legitimately review those.

That's what I was thinking - everyone just wants a "perfect world" and it won't ever happen.

Thanks
David

7 freaking calls over a 40 yr. time span, has someone's panties in a frenzy? And it's only someone's "OPINION", (and we know what those are synonymous with), that they were blown calls.

Get a life.

Listen, bottom line here is that if your going to loose sleep about whether someone is going to try and overrule your decisions on the field whether by picture, replay, verbal abuse or any other means, then maybe you need a little thicker skin to do this job. Over thousands of games that I have officiated in two sports, I find it nearly impossible to count on two fingers the number of games where everyone has agreed with every one of my calls.

I still sleep soundly, each and every night. (with the exception of the nights I pig out out on the delicious Mexican food)

Well, you know there were probably 7 calls over the last 40 days that would get overturned by the new replay system. These so-called expert journalists just felt 7 critical calls made during post-season play were worthy of mentioning in their argument.

The problem is, not all 7 deserved mentioning, and they probably left out a few others that were more applicable. Just off the top of my head, I recall the gross phantom tag by Chuck Knoblauch against Jose Offermann in the 1999 ALCS that would get an overturn.

The Armbrister/Fisk collision? Hell no. In fact, there's a rule that covers that.

And then to top the week off I sat and watched a portion of the NYY vs Red Sox game yesterday until I had to shut it down because of this horrible announcer whose first name is Tim.

What an idiot he is. You just can't fix Stupid.

Thinking about stupid announcers,

I think that replay in the NFL has forced the announcers to know the rules a bit better. They have to be able to talk about the play like "I think the QB's hand was moving forward... The referee is going to call this an incomplete pass". Perhaps the addition of instant replay to more situations in MLB will force the talking heads to actually learn some of the rules...

I know, fat chance, but I can hope...

Yes but on IFF, whether it was or was not catchable TRULY is judgment, and not something concrete that can be seen on replay (like safe/out, tag/no tag, etc) - how are you going to review that and definitely change a call like this one.

Doubtful. The overwhelmingly vast majority of plays that will get reviewed under the MLB's expansion of IR use will be your questionable fair/foul and catch/no catch calls, as well as routine bangers at the bases.

Don't forget that these announcers were ball players at one time. The same is true about managers. Do you really expect managers to learn the rules so that they will know when to challenge a rule misinterpretation for the suits in New York to review? Naah, they'll save their challenges for the safe/out call.

I certainly hope so. When you think they misinterpret a rule, you don't challenge; you protest.

True. But the question now becomes, will this be something that gets reviewed immediately under the IR expansion?

Take a recent example, the one where an entire crew didn't know the substitute pitching rule, and allowed a pitcher to be replaced when that pitcher never faced a batter. Sure, the manager can protest. But that protest just gets lodged and gets reviewed later, well after the game ends.

What if a manager wants to exercise one of his IR challenges on this so that he can get the matter resolved immediately, and not have to wait for the protest process to run its course. Will that be allowed?

I say No. Rule misinterps will probably still go through the protest route, just like it does now. So I don't see the new IR expansion doing anything to get announcers to bone up on rules as john5396 hopes.

http://blog.chron.com/ultimateastros...tching-change/

They aren't going to use challenges in U10 baseball, which is about the highest level you'll see R3 do that in the situation you described.

One thing I would like to see is IR cause fewer arguments. On a bang/bang play, if the manager comes out the umpire would say "are you requesting a challenge? If not, get back to the dugout." That way as the game is slowed down by challenges, it is sped up by the lack of unchallenged arguments.

No manager would want to do that. A winnable protest is a managers best friend. Win the game, drop the protest. Lose the game replay from the point of your protest.

I'm thinking that will be part of the process.

Challenge or get ejected, manager's choice.