There was a moment in this game where I had a bad trepidation, and no, it did not involve Angel Hernandez calling balls and strikes. It was after Gabe Kapler called for an intentional walk to the Dodgers 8'th place hitter, AJ Pollack and Julio Urias LHP stepped to the plate. The TV graphic showed a BA of .208 or something like that. I said to myself, "uh oh! Thats pretty good for a pitcher. This might not go so well!" Kevin Gausman RHP hung a splitter and Urias roped it into RF to drive in the Dodgers first run and we already kind of knew where this game was headed.
Angel Hernandez is widely believed to be the worse umpire in MLB, and he may well be. He did not get off to a good start in this game when he called Giants leadoff batter Darin Ruf out on a pitch that had a lot of air between it and the strike zone graphic on the TV screen. The Twitter outrage machine went into high gear and the charge was led by Jalynne Crawford. Now, I'm generally quite judgmental with umpires and the strike zone. I'm on record supporting the use of an electronic strike zone. I mean, it's either the gold standard and they should use it or it's not and they should not show it on TV broadcasts or use it to grade umpires. From that point on, I was paying pretty close attention and I honestly thought Angel Hernandez called a pretty good game. Yes, there were some apparent missed calls, but keep in mind the umpire grading system allows a 2 inch gray area on either side of the electronic margin which is actually quite large when you are looking at the graphic on TV. After the Ruf miss, almost all of Hernandez' subsequent questionable calls were well within the accepted margin of error and honestly could have been called either way. The questionable calls seemed to be evenly divided between hurting/helping both teams. I've seen way worse home plate umpiring just within the last two weeks!
My advice to Jalynne Crawford is to pipe down on Twitter. The last thing the Giants need right now is for the umps to feel like the Giants and/or their families are unfairly or even fairly, showing the up. Angel Hernandez did not cost the Giants this game and I am pretty sure Brandon Crawford would be the first person to say so.
Hernandez's erratic pitch calling forces batters to go out of their zones. In the Giants' current scheme of things: lay off close pitches & look for something to hit hard, is undermined by umpires like Hernandez. He set the tone early and, uncharacteristically, Kapler's three big moments backfired — pitching to Urias, pulling Gausman, hanging Littell out there. Kapler usually gets things right but the players failed him last night. It happens.
ReplyDeleteI'm all in on the computerized zone.
ReplyDeleteEvery wrong call brings it that much closer.