Fire the Umps

[spidernat]

Or, like all rational people, they realize that not every bad call is a conspiracy against PC's favorite teams.

[comish4lif]

I am dying to hear a reasonable counter argument against. No, "it takes the human element out of it" is not reasonable.

It will happen. It's a question of when, not if. They said we would never get instant replay either.

Robots umpiring - the point is to take the human element out of it.

As for different batter heights, in this day of big data and fast processing, it wouldn't be difficult to ask a hitter to take 10 swings with some sensors on him or a video capture and determine where the hollow of his knee and his armpits are while swinging to determine each batter's precise rulebook strike zone.

[Minty Fresh]

This all sounds wonderful.  How many of you are willing to start paying $250/ticket to pay for all this R&D and then implementation?

[Kevrock]

Really shows how bad the Nats got hosed:
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-washington-nationals-vs-vic-carapazza/

This is a great breakdown. Recommend others take a look.

[MarquisDeSade]

This all sounds wonderful.  How many of you are willing to start paying $250/ticket to pay for all this R&D and then implementation?

It's not expensive technology so you wouldn't see an increase in ticket prices.  The more important thing that nobody seems to be mentioning is that there is no chance the MLBPA or Umpire's union allows that to happen. 

This is a great breakdown. Recommend others take a look.

The pitch types are self reported and, like all PitchF/X data, is two dimensions not three so this type of analysis suspect at best.  Unless I missed it, they didn't mention or break out which pitches were from lefties and which pitches were breaking pitches.  Those are big things to leave out.

[Minty Fresh]

It's not expensive technology

You have data to support that?  How does the ethereal strikezone appear?  Sensors I assume?  Where are the sensors located?  All ballparks are different so how/where are they mounted?  Won't ballparks have to be retrofitted in certain areas to ensure consistency from park-to-park?

I can't imagine that the R&D involved in implememting this sort of system would be cheap.

[Vega]

You have data to support that?  How does the ethereal strikezone appear?  Sensors I assume?  Where are the sensors located?  All ballparks are different so how/where are they mounted?  Won't ballparks have to be retrofitted in certain areas to ensure consistency from park-to-park?

I can't imagine that the R&D involved in implememting this sort of system would be cheap.

It'll probably cost less than Rafael Soriano.

[MarquisDeSade]

You have data to support that?

Calm down Francis, we're not talking about some SBIR program that's changing salt water into jet fuel or time travel, we're talking about a way to determine if a ball breaks a standard plane over home plate.  This technology already exists in tennis but, as I've said before, this would only allow you to know whether nor not a ball crossed the plate (at least 51% of the area of the ball) at some point not if it was between the letters and the knees. 

[Minty Fresh]

It'll probably cost less than Rafael Soriano.

Dunno.  Soriano is fairly priceless.   

[Minty Fresh]

Calm down Francis, we're not talking about some SBIR program that's changing salt water into jet fuel or time travel, we're talking about a way to determine if a ball breaks a standard plane over home plate.  This technology already exists in tennis but, as I've said before, this would only allow you to know whether nor not a ball crossed the plate (at least 51% of the area of the ball) at some point not if it was between the letters and the knees.

And that's what I'm saying.  You need to put a serious amount of R&D into getting a truly 3-dimensional strikezone as people here want to have in place to replace the humans.  Who pays for that and how much does it cost?  Because you know the cheap-ass baseball owners are going to pass the buck to the fans since baseball is losing popularity and eventually these mega-deal tv contracts will expire.

[wpa2629]

and for good measure a giant LOL at Tom Hallion's strike zone tonight

Holy hell - wow

[Kevrock]

We didn't see it in 3D so it doesn't count.

[Jordanz Meatballz]

How is the strikezone 3D exactly? It may change size, but the front of the plate should be where the cutoff is right?

[comish4lif]

How is the strikezone 3D exactly? It may change size, but the front of the plate should be where the cutoff is right?

In practice yes. But in theory, a ball moving from a righty could catch the side of the plate, but not the front.

The strike zen technically is five sided and about 2' tall, give or take.

[PC]

This is the Kemp at bat in the 9th where he lost it.  That hieroglyph on the right is pitch 4 and pitch 5, completely on top of each other.  Pitch 4 was a ball.  Pitch 5 was strike 3.

[varoadking]

(Image removed from quote.)

This is the Kemp at bat in the 9th where he lost it.  That hieroglyph on the right is pitch 4 and pitch 5, completely on top of each other.  Pitch 4 was a ball.  Pitch 5 was strike 3.

Yes...that was insane...

[Minty Fresh]

How is the strikezone 3D exactly? It may change size, but the front of the plate should be where the cutoff is right?

No. 

The STRIKE ZONE is that area over home plate the upper limit of which is a horizontal line at the midpoint between the top of the shoulders and the top of the uniform pants, and the lower level is a line at the hollow beneath the knee cap. The Strike Zone shall be determined from the batter's stance as the batter is prepared to swing at a pitched ball.

The key word is "area," despite Kevrock's best efforts to mock the theory.

[MarquisDeSade]

How is the strikezone 3D exactly? It may change size, but the front of the plate should be where the cutoff is right?

This is the problem with PitchF/X - it only shows where the ball stopped moving, not where it moved and if it crossed the plate at some point.  A pitch (for example a wicked slider or slurve) could end up outside of the zone on PitchF/X but have passed over the plate (or hit the black) at some point.  Think about how a backdoor slider or a cutter moves and you can see why this is an issue.

[Kevrock]

I'm trolling all over the map about 3D zones when we weren't getting calls on center-cut fastballs, but MDS does have a good point if that's how Pitch FX works.

[wpa2629]

(Image removed from quote.)

This is the Kemp at bat in the 9th where he lost it.  That hieroglyph on the right is pitch 4 and pitch 5, completely on top of each other.  Pitch 4 was a ball.  Pitch 5 was strike 3.

Ugh

That's so disheartening

[wpa2629]

I'm trolling all over the map about 3D zones when we weren't getting calls on center-cut fastballs, but MDS does have a good point if that's how Pitch FX works.

You know when Drew threw that slider right over the heart of the plate for strike 3 for a second there I thought Hallion was going to call that a Ball!!

[HalfSmokes]

Robots umpiring - the point is to take the human element out of it.

As for different batter heights, in this day of big data and fast processing, it wouldn't be difficult to ask a hitter to take 10 swings with some sensors on him or a video capture and determine where the hollow of his knee and his armpits are while swinging to determine each batter's precise rulebook strike zone.

I wonder what stance guys would use for baseline swings

[Jordanz Meatballz]

Ok, so it seems that the strike zone is a pentagonal prism that varies in height based on the batter's stance as he prepares to hit the ball.

Set up the Pitch fx system to capture the point the ball crosses the front of the plate as well as the back of the plate, and use math to determine if it at any point nicked the pentagonal prism. Also have it capture the batter's stance at the moment of release to determine the height. Maybe have the batters wear sensors. Sounds expensive and like it would take knowledge of algorithms, but you could probably get baseball nerds to crowdfund it.

[GburgNatsFan]

Ask Jayson for help. He can do algorithms.

Ok, so it seems that the strike zone is a pentagonal prism that varies in height based on the batter's stance as he prepares to hit the ball.

Set up the Pitch fx system to capture the point the ball crosses the front of the plate as well as the back of the plate, and use math to determine if it at any point nicked the pentagonal prism. Also have it capture the batter's stance at the moment of release to determine the height. Maybe have the batters wear sensors. Sounds expensive and like it would take knowledge of algorithms, but you could probably get baseball nerds to crowdfund it.

[Baseball is Life]

So the only argument I've heard is that it's too expensive to implement or it's too technically difficult. Puhhlllease. They said the same thing about instant reply. They could get this done by spring training if they wanted.

I'm surprised the naysayers are not using the more logical argument against it...A precise strike zone could possibly give hitters an advantage and therefore would throw off the whole dynamic of the game.