Friday, October 08, 2010

Instant Replay in Baseball

We had another controversy last night when in the 4th inning Buster Posey was called safe at second on a steal when replays showed him being out. Posey of course went on to score the only run in the game, leading to a big up roar again of bringing instant replay to baseball.

I go back and forth on whether baseball should adopt instant replay. On one hand, you want the call correct, on the other hand, human error is part of the game. Also if the umpires are leaving the field every inning to huddle up somewhere around a monitor, it'll turn games into 4 and half hour affairs (and Yankee /Red Sox games into 6 hours!).

How about this compromise:

Each manager gets one "replay request" a game to use whenever he wants. If it's a questionable call, he can use his one allotment. Once he uses it, he doesn't have another so he better make sure it's a crucial call effecting the outcome. The home plate umpire has an earpiece that someone up in the booth can relay to him what the correct call should be, so it gets ruled on immediately and not taking 5 minutes with the umpires leaving the field.

Simple, quick and prevents the managers from having every questionable call checked.

What do you think?

Bill

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