People complained that the reviews of the Gary Sheffield and Daniel Murphy home runs this week took too long, with the former taking more than six minutes and the latter almost four minutes. I can understand the frustration, but you have to laud Major League Baseball for having its priorities in order:
“In the case you’re talking about, the home run call on Sheffield, that one took about six minutes - just over six minutes. And the reason for that was because we were really trying to get clear and convincing evidence if we were going to overturn the call. So we were pulling up all the various camera angles that we had available to us, and it took us some time to discern whether or not that play could be overturned. Ultimately, the home run was upheld, but it took a little time. But we want to get the play right. The ultimate, ultimate, overriding concern is to get the play right.”
Which it should be. We can argue about whether or not replay itself is a good idea, but if you’re going to go with replay, there’s no reason to rush it if it risks getting the call wrong.
Not that baseball shouldn’t do what it can to speed up the process where it can. Indeed, based on some of the reviews we’ve seen, I can think of two things that would go a long way towards making replays as efficient as possible.
First: strongly discourage umpires from standing around trying to decide if a replay should be reviewed. During last week’s Red Sox-Mets game, the umps held a conclave around third base for some time, apparently trying to determine if Youkilis’ shot down the left field line should be reviewed. We all got pride, and umpires more than most of us, but really, it was obvious within about five seconds of the ball clearing the fence that there was a question as to whether it was fair or foul. End the conference, go watch the video, get the call right, and play ball.
Second: as we get more experience with replays, patterns are probably going to develop. We can imagine, for example, that given the stupid placement of the railing and advertisements on the upper deck at Citi Field, that more than a few disputed calls are going to occur there. Indeed, just about every park is going to have its own particular problem areas, and once they’re identified, perhaps it would be worth installing some fixed cameras that focus specifically on those areas. Also, given that balls over the foul pole are going to be an issue, maybe baseball should install the same sort of camera that sits on every set of goal posts in the NFL.
Heck, they could even solicit sponsorships for the things. Based on the great publicity they’re getting over the Murphy homer, Subway would probably pony up at this point.