Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeart Radio. Hey brain Stuff, Lauren voggle Bomb. Here forget about angels in the outfield? What about robots behind home plate? Ever since the words playball we're first uttered A baseball fans have belly ached about the quality of umpires, especially when it
comes to their calling balls and strikes. But from the be careful what you wish for category comes the track Man Automated Ball Strike System, also known as the a B S System or robo umpires, and Major League Baseball is poised to expand the automated strike zone experiment from Low A to Triple A, the highest level of the minor leagues and just a mere call up from the
big leagues. The a B S System doesn't look anything like we hoped or perhaps imagined it would, which, let's be honest, is probably C three p O and dark slacks, a black polo and a chess protector. The a B S system is essentially a flat black box situated high
behind home plate. It looks almost like a flat screen television that's not turned on, but it's super advanced and uses radar and synchronized cameras to track just about everything about a pitch, including its release speed and height, a spin rate and access extension, and vertical and horizontal release angles, and in the strike zone it tracks the home plate height,
plate side, and vertical and horizontal approach angles. After recording these stats on any given pitch, the system determines whether it's a ball or a strike, and then relays that information to the human umpire on the field via an earpiece and smartphone. The human umpire makes the call and can override the A B S system if they disagree.
The idea here is not too welcome an emissary of our future robot overlords onto the field, but rather to make calling balls and strikes the most precise aspect of any baseball game. With a computer picking up the pitches within the designated parameters of the strike zone, it presumably will be more accurate than relying on a human being who may be distracted and fallible at home plate. The
system has its fans and its detractors. The robo umpire tends to call more strikes, including higher and lower strikes, and often displays an acute sensitivity to check swings. The software appears to have some trouble with breaking ball pitches that drop in front of the catcher. But all of that is where the human umpire element still comes in.
And yes, the inevitable has already happened. Back in twenty nine one, Frank Viola, the pitching coach of the High Point Rockers in the Atlantic Coast League, became the first person in baseball to be ejected for arguing the strike zone with a robo umpire. More precisely, Viola's anger was directed at a human umpire for not overturning the ruling on the field. Viola later treated that his biggest beef was not knowing who was in charge the track Man
a b S system or the human umpire regardless. Hall of Fame third baseman Mike Schmidt wrote a piece for The Associated Press in twenty nineteen advocating the further testing and use of robotic umpires and stating that it would quote change the game for the good and continue to
eliminate human deficiency. In announcing intentions to put the system in place for testing in low a, Southeast, Major League Baseball said it believed track Man would ensure consistency in the strike zone and improve the pace of the game. The Southeastern Conference announced in March of two that it will use the track Man V three stadium system to monitor each pitch for accuracy of every Conference Baseball game inning with two baseball season. The track Man B three
will also be used for the SEC Baseball Tournament. There's no word yet on when the A B S system might be seen in Major League ballparks. The Major League Baseball Players Association said no to robo umpires in major league parks for the season during its most recent labor negotiations, but Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred told ESPN that
he'd like to have them in ballparks. Today's episode is based on the article robot umps will be calling pitches at future MLB games on Housta works dot com, written by Patty Resmussen. Brain Stuff is production by Heart Radio in partnership with how stuff works dot Com and as produced by Tyler Klang and Ramsey Out four more podcasts from my heart Radio. Visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.