MLB players are giving their new robot umpire overlords a cautious welcome

Anger over blown calls is as old as baseball itself. But in Spring Training this year, players can ask technology for a little help

For the first time ever this month, major league players who disagree with an umpire’s rendering of the strike zone can do something about it. Something other than an exaggerated pantomime of disbelief or a testy reply liable to get them thrown out of the game entirely. They can do something effectual, productive, process-based. They can appeal to a higher power, one that has become revered within the sport for its ability to optimize anything and everything: Technology.

Major League Baseball is testing the challenge system version of the Automated Ball-Strike System (ABS) in roughly 60% of Spring Training games this preseason. In layman’s terms: this spring, players can ask robot umps to review pitch calls.

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