MLB hoping for large replay expansion in 2014

Major League Baseball appears set for a vast expansion of video review by umpires in 2014 and is examining whether all calls other than balls or strikes should be subject to instant replay.

Replay has been in place for home run calls since August 2008. Commissioner Bud Selig initially wanted to add trap plays and fair/foul calls down the lines for 2013, but change was put off while more radical options were examined.

‘‘My opinion has evolved,’’ baseball Commissioner Bud Selig said Thursday after MLB executive vice president Joe Torre gave an update at a quarterly owners’ meeting.
Torre hopes to have proposals by the Aug. 14-15 session in Cooperstown…

‘‘That really caught my eye and caught my attention with the fact that there was more conversation about that instead of the game itself,’’ Torre said. ‘‘There’s no question we’re considering much more than the trap play and fair/foul. But again, one of the decisions we have to make is how much of this do we want to do without really disrupting and putting people to sleep?’‘

Stark: Former umps chief on replay: ‘Let’s go’

Yeah…go and buy myself a boatload of freakin’ Ficklin Vintage Port.

But one person who checked in—via seven different emails—really, really, really got my attention.

That would be Mike Port. The same Mike Port who spent six years (2005-11) as baseball’s vice president of umpiring after a long career as a general manager and executive for the Angels, Red Sox and Padres.

And his response to yet another year’s delay in utilizing a technology the NFL first tapped into 27 years ago could be summed up in two words:

“Let’s go.”

Why, he wondered, did baseball spend massive amounts of money over the past two years studying ways to review calls that almost never happen—fair/foul and trap/catch? Excellent question.

“Any CLUB employee could give one an estimate as to how many times (in a season) they had seen an incorrect call on fair/foul or an incorrect call on a trap/catch,” Port wrote. “The answer: DAMN FEW. Out of about 22,000 regular-season innings generally played, there might be 3-6 such occurrences annually LEAGUE-WIDE. So what does baseball do? Negotiates expanding replay to cover such plays.”

...“Let’s go,” Mike Port wrote. “Baseball moves at Neanderthal speed in too in many of its undertakings.”

Hey, ya think? Once, not so long ago, Port said, he was opposed to replay in baseball, too. But he has spent the past few years studying the NFL and come to a simple conclusion: They get it. Baseball, on the other hand? Not so much, he’s decided.

So …

“It’s time,” he said, “for baseball to move into the 19th century and show some responsiveness to its fans.”

Calcaterra: Expanded replay is not coming in 2013, but boy howdy, look out for 2014

And the next step down toward terminal NFL doom will be a chewing-his-nose Bill Cowher type doing pre-games. Hold tight, PBA….I might be coming back.

I guess the post office has finally delivered those letters Bud Selig had been asking for, because Jayson Stark reports that there will likely be expanded replay in 2014.

There had been talk of expanding replay to some degree in 2013 — to fair/foul calls, mostly — but Stark reports that people in the game are taking a go-big-or-go-home approach and would prefer to implement something more comprehensive. That will take waiting a year as opposed to rushing something into place this year.  Which, OK, even though I wish we had replay yesterday, I agree is probably the best move. Let’s do this thing right if we’re going to do it.

The only unsettling part is that, according to Stark, there is still some debate about what sort of system to implement and that — brace yourselves — some version of a challenge system is still on the table. Stark refers to a plan in which managers may get, say, two challenges a game for close calls.

Which I absolutely hate.  Either commit to getting all or as many calls correct as possible or don’t. Don’t make some game out of it where — sorry, Cholly! — you just lost a big game because you foolishly wasted your challenges on clear umpire mistakes in the first couple of innings and now you’re stuck with a clear umpire mistake in the eighth!

Verducci: Replay, rosters and the nine rules that baseball needs to change

Verducci effects change.