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Hacksaw’s Thursday Podcast..1pm
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“BASEBALL & UMPIRES”
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What to do about the Men-in-Blue?

Umpiring in baseball is under siege.
The game has changed.
It is so much faster, so much more pressurized, full of big plays.
Full of mistakes too.

And this is the most important time of the season, with playoff spots on the line, and then the most critical part of the year, the playoffs into the World Series.

And the big stories are the showdown games, the Dodgers fight to hold onto first place, the Padres clash to take the top wildcard spot, and what’s going on in the AL-East, the year long war with the Yankees-Orioles.

But here we are at crunch time, and the games are marred by constant issues with the umpires.

Balls and strikes calls.
Safe or out at the plate or on the bases.
Balks-walks-hits batsmen.
Rules interpretations delays.
Instant replay challenges.
Pitch clock violations
Rabbit ears injections
Moving strike zones

It seems to be getting worse, and next on the horizon will be the robo-ump computer situation, and the manager’s challenge system that will be introduced.

And baseball could be looking at full implementation of the computerized strike zone the following season.

Of course the purists say leave the human element in the game, including the umpires.

But in the aftermath of the Padres-Astros fiasco on Tuesday night, things are out of control.

The 5-minute delay as the Umps talked to New York about interpretation of the rules over the pitch clock situation and the timeouts.

Add on the Jurickson Profar hit by pitch affair, where both he and the Astros said he was not plunked by a pitch.  He wanted his at bat, but they sent him to first base, where the rally died and he cursed the umps on the way back to the dugout.

And the hilarity-ejection of Jose Altuve taking off his shoe and sock after saying he got plucked by a pitch on the foot.  That to be followed by his ejection.  And then his manager got tossed.

Nothing like letting the game get out of control because the umps cannot cope with all the rule changes.

And here we are, almost to the playoffs in what goes down as the worst year of umpiring we have seen in a long, long time.

And we thought ridding the game of Umpire Angel Hernandez would solve alot of the controversy.  Sure did not because alot of his fellow umps are not doing much better.

The ‘Men in Blue’ giving baseball a ‘Black Eye’.

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