After yet another umpiring blunder, this one preventing a game-tying home run in the ninth inning for the Oakland Athletics off the bat of Adam Rosales against Cleveland on Wednesday night, it is time for Major League Baseball to do something.
One simple, easy solution would be to adopt the NHL style of replay, with an official watching a monitor and communicating with the officials via telephone on goals that require an extra look.
It is a quick process that takes maybe one minute to get to the phone, communicate with the official and a decision to be rendered. By comparison, it took the umpires in Cleveland on Wednesday night three minutes to make a (bad) call.
Bud Selig and his merry band of misfits have been so resistant to the idea of change and threatening the "integrity" of the umpires that, even though the technology exists, replay is limited to home run calls.
Yet, as we saw on Wednesday night, not even the replay monitors that the umpires have is good enough to get the calls correct.
Second base umpire Angel Hernandez, who made the initial call of a double and upheld it upon further review, said after the game (via ESPN.com) that the crew did not have 100 percent evidence based on what it saw.
It wasn't evident on the TV we had it was a home run. I don't know what kind of replay you had, but you can't reverse a call unless there is 100 percent evidence, and there wasn't 100 percent evidence.
While this does make you wonder exactly what kind of television monitor they are looking at, this is the impetus that MLB needs to overhaul the way that replay is used in all 30 stadiums.
ESPN's Jayson Stark said on the radio (via Business Insider) in May 2012 that the plans included using a group of umpires at a central location. On plays that were called wrong, the central hub would signal the umpires at the games that the calls needed to be changed.
He also said that the system would initially be for home runs, fair and foul balls and whether a player catches the ball.
So, for instance, the botched infield-fly rule call during the Wild Card game between St. Louis and Atlanta last year would not have been part of these changes.
Of course, these changes don't appear to be a hot-button issue for MLB. At the time Stark made the announcement, he said the league was hoping to implement it in time for the 2013 season. We see how well that time-frame worked out.
The idea of replay in baseball is a good one, but because the game is so much different than any other sport, it is harder to bring it in on everything. Where do you put a player on a ball hit down the line originally called foul that turns out to be fair? What happens on trap plays with runners on base?
There are a lot of logistical problems that would have to be worked out, but the fact that the NHL has an easy system to look at replays, determine if the call is right or wrong and get it into the referee in a timely manner should be the model baseball follows.
We are in very dangerous territory with the umpires right now. They are becoming more and more a part of the story, be it because of bad strike three calls, a misinterpretation of the infield fly rule, being comically over the top when ejecting players and managers or botching a home run call even after looking at the replay.
What if this was the final game of the World Series and the umpires had made this call? Or what if it was a game on the final day of the year that determined who got in the playoffs?
MLB has to realize that there is going to come a time when these umpires botch a call in a national game that is going to play a pivotal role in the outcome. Rather than have that be the final word, why not take the few simple steps necessary to get the call right?
This sport, despite what some might have you believe because it doesn't draw NFL-style ratings on television, is in a great place financially. Two separate agreements were reached last year to keep MLB games on ESPN, Fox and Turner networks worth $12.4 billion.
Is it really going to cost that much money to, say, set up a base of operations for a group of umpires at the league offices in New York to watch games and get in contact with umpires if/when a situation arises?
And even though we laugh at the NHL for having the worst labor relations of the major North American sports, it is still so far advanced when it comes to replay and making sure the integrity of the games aren't compromised by bad officiating.
Baseball is a game that is so resistant to the idea of change. Just look at the way a lot of people out there talk about some of the new-age stats that are out there. If you write about things like WAR or xFIP, just as many people are going to say that you are an idiot as will tell you that it is good you are right to look at the game in a different way.
The people who wanted to see Mike Trout win the AL MVP award last year didn't understand the purpose of the award because Miguel Cabrera led the league in three offensive categories.
What we want to see when watching a baseball game are the phenomenal athletic talents of the players on the field. We can debate the merits of Trout and Cabrera, but at least the argument is ours and can be very fun, if occasionally heated.
Umpires are taking the fun out of the game by feeling threatened by the idea of a replay monitor telling them how to do their job correctly. But if there was something out there that could help you do your job better, wouldn't you want to take full advantage of it?
Having replay officials in one central location to guide the umpires through a call that could help a team win or tie a game should be of the utmost importance for baseball. If it's not, then you are threatening the integrity of the game.
Hopefully the botched call in Cleveland, not to mention the many others that have happened just in the last few years, will spring the Commissioner's Office into action this time around. We know the technology is out there.
For more talk of why replay is needed in MLB, or anything else baseball related, hit me up on Twitter with questions or comments.
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