Blue Jays (Yesavage) vs Royals (Wacha): 9/21/25, 2:10pm

[mphenhef]

12 hours ago, Jesusindashed said:

Struggled a bit with command but the ump did him no favours

I kind of wondered how things would have gone for him with Kirk behind the dish stealing some extra strikes for him, especially on the low strikes being called balls.

[saskjayfan]

15 hours ago, neverbeenhere said:

I thought I heard it was still not 100% as a righty 

He hit a homer at Buffalo from the right side 111.5 mph off the bat.  He's taking his walks.  He should be in the lineup Tuesday.  Cheers bitches....we're back in the playoffs!

[Jesusindashed]

15 hours ago, Spanky__99 said:

I don't think he struggled with command, ump just squeezed the f*** out of him. Than that horrible call with Varsho's catch was icing on the cake, he was screwed. Well, aside from the one that slipped out of his fingers, his command was fine.

I disagree two things can be true.. ump squeezed him but he never had command of his split left a bunch middle of the plate  and wasnt quite as sharp 

 

He did get royally screwed on that ridiculous replay but a lot of hard contact was given up

[Laika]

I still can't even fathom an explanation for that Varsho play not being ruled a catch. 

well, I guess I can. maybe for one frame the ball was not visible in the glove and some loser with a Jeter tattoo on his back took the position that it was therefore not possible to prove with 100% certainty that the ball wasn't touching a blade of grass at that moment.

Not sure why the burden of proof for overturning a baseball ump's ruling needs to be as high as a murder conviction, but here we are. 

[Laika]

Actually, you could say that the standard of proof is even higher. 

To convict someone of a crime like murder you need to prove that they did it "beyond a reasonable doubt."

To overturn an MLB ump's ruling you need "clear and convincing evidence" that the call was wrong.

Semantics, but you could say that the burden of proof is higher in baseball video reviews lol. 

[Big_Walleye]

2 minutes ago, Laika said:

Actually, you could say that the standard of proof is even higher. 

To convict someone of a crime like murder you need to prove that they did it "beyond a reasonable doubt."

To overturn an MLB ump's ruling you need "clear and convincing evidence" that the call was wrong.

Semantics, but you could say that the burden of proof is higher in baseball video reviews lol. 

I think baseball needs to instruct umpires to give the "playmaker" the benefit of the doubt with the onfield calls.  They can always overturn it later if evidence warrants it.  Good players are getting robbed of great plays the way it stands.  If the Lukes play was called interference by the ump on the field it would have stood.

The Varsho play boggles the mind either way.  That's the worst I've ever seen.  That guy plays his a$$ off in centre and got robbed of a spectacular play.

[Stangstag]

2 minutes ago, Big_Walleye said:

I think baseball needs to instruct umpires to give the "playmaker" the benefit of the doubt with the onfield calls.  They can always overturn it later if evidence warrants it.  Good players are getting robbed of great plays the way it stands.  If the Lukes play was called interference by the ump on the field it would have stood.

The Varsho play boggles the mind either way.  That's the worst I've ever seen.  That guy plays his a$$ off in centre and got robbed of a spectacular play.

Its just so inconsistent. You hear the “100% conclusive” rule for overturning a play, yet there are times a play is overturned that’s definitely NOT conclusive.

It should be the same umps in the replay room permanently, to keep things consistent.

[Big_Walleye]

4 minutes ago, Stangstag said:

Its just so inconsistent. You hear the “100% conclusive” rule for overturning a play, yet there are times a play is overturned that’s definitely NOT conclusive.

It should be the same umps in the replay room permanently, to keep things consistent.

Maybe they shouldn't use umps at all.  How about soccer referees from South America who are less likely to be Yankees fans?🤨

[Laika]

They need to just redefine the standard of review.

Get rid of this "clear and convincing evidence" language. 

Change it to something like "the call on the field shall be overturned if the replay official determines that there is reasonable evidence that the call on the field was incorrect" 

And then instruct the replay officials that they don't need a "smoking gun" anymore, they just need video that shows that the call on the field was probably wrong. 

If the video is a coin-flip then the on field call stands. 

 

EZ

 

Oh yeah, and we are moving the MLB central replay war room to Regina. 

[Spanky__99]

1 hour ago, Laika said:

I still can't even fathom an explanation for that Varsho play not being ruled a catch. 

well, I guess I can. maybe for one frame the ball was not visible in the glove and some loser with a Jeter tattoo on his back took the position that it was therefore not possible to prove with 100% certainty that the ball wasn't touching a blade of grass at that moment.

Not sure why the burden of proof for overturning a baseball ump's ruling needs to be as high as a murder conviction, but herehis is what MLB we are. 

This is what the MLB said...

"After viewing all relevant angles, the replay official could not definitively determine that the fielder had firm and secure possession of the ball prior to any part of the ball touching the ground," Shulman shared on the broadcast.

[G-Snarls]

1 hour ago, Spanky__99 said:

This is what the MLB said...

"After viewing all relevant angles, the replay official could not definitively determine that the fielder had firm and secure possession of the ball prior to any part of the ball touching the ground," Shulman shared on the broadcast.

Which makes zero sense of course when you NEVER SEE THE BALL HIT THE GROUND

 

 

[Stangstag]

12 minutes ago, Spanky__99 said:

This is what the MLB said...

"After viewing all relevant angles, the replay official could not definitively determine that the fielder had firm and secure possession of the ball prior to any part of the ball touching the ground," Shulman shared on the broadcast.

Did they review these angles with their eyes open or closed 

[Spanky__99]

12 minutes ago, G-Snarls said:

Which makes zero sense of course when you NEVER SEE THE BALL HIT THE GROUND

 

 

 

11 minutes ago, Stangstag said:

Did they review these angles with their eyes open or closed 

[John_Havok]

1 hour ago, Laika said:

They need to just redefine the standard of review.

Get rid of this "clear and convincing evidence" language. 

Change it to something like "the call on the field shall be overturned if the replay official determines that there is reasonable evidence that the call on the field was incorrect" 

And then instruct the replay officials that they don't need a "smoking gun" anymore, they just need video that shows that the call on the field was probably wrong. 

If the video is a coin-flip then the on field call stands. 

 

EZ

 

Oh yeah, and we are moving the MLB central replay war room to Regina. 

Fixing it is actually really easy, they just have to stop reviewing the call made, and just review the play as if no call has been made. All they need to look for is proof that an out should be called and in the absence of that, the review should call the play safe. 

Whatever language they want to use... clear and convincing, beyond a reasonable doubt... etc is all semantics that everyone will interpret differently anyways. It's incredibly easy to sync up EVERY camera angle on any play in the digital age and run them frame by frame in a matter of seconds. 

THEN, the replay room should be required to log the entire process and explain why they made the call they did and that information should be accessible to all teams the following day for transparency, as well as MLB so they can review the calls to make sure they can intervene going forward to make clarifications. 

Like, in the case of Varsho's catch... the review team would have to explain why they ruled it a non-catch, in detail. Not just "well, we saw go in the glove on the fly, but... there was this one frame where we think it might have fallen out and we're not sure so...we went with safe"... that wouldn't fly. 

[Brownie19]

I actually really like that.  There's no need to consider what call was made on the field (other than to stroke an umpires ego).

[Jonn]

The only thing they should do is once they choose to review it. The orginal call is thrown out. And make a new call based on the results of the replay both in real time and slow motion. They have all the right technology to make these calls right and aren’t getting them right because they installed this weird on field verdict as a deciding factor.