ABS flipped 54 percent of calls in first year
Here's the details, starting with who benefited most and least:
>The Cincinnati Reds had a net gain of 16.8 runs, according to Baseball Savant calculations of total run value of overturns on challenges. The Los Angeles Angels were next at 14, followed by the Athletics (12.3) and Minnesota (10.1).
>Cleveland was 30th at minus-13.4 and several other playoff teams rated poorly by that metric: the Los Angeles Dodgers (26th, -8.5), Tampa Bay (25th, -7.8), the Chicago Cubs (21st, -4.6), Milwaukee (20th, -2.4), Atlanta (18th, -2.1), San Diego (17th, -1.9), the New York Yankees (16th, -2.1) and Houston (15th, -0.8).
>Houston’s Jose Altuve topped batters with 5.6 projected runs gained, followed by Seattle’s Cal Raleigh (4.6), Colorado’s Kyle Karros (4.5) and Cincinnati’s Sal Stewart (4.4) and JJ Bleday (4.1).
>The Cubs’ Seiya Suzuki led with 5.7 runs projected lost in defensive challenges, just ahead of the Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani (5.5), the Cubs’ Ian Happ (5.2) and Michael Busch (5.1), and the New York Mets’ Brett Baty (3.5).
>Milwaukee’s William Contreras led catchers with 5.2 projected runs prevented, just in front of Cleveland’s Patrick Bailey (5.1), the Mets’ Francisco Alvarez (4.5) and San Diego’s Freddy Fermin, Kansas City’s Carter Jensen and Drew Romo of the Chicago White Sox (all 4.3).
Then the bigger picture:
>There were 10,557 challenges, an average of 4.35 per game, and 5,686 led to overturned decisions.
>Catchers succeeded on 59% of their challenges, while batters had a 49% success rate and pitchers — who seldom challenged compared to catchers and batters — were at 40%.
Finally, the winners and losers among umps. Note: Based on minimum challenge volume, a guy like Bucknor isn't ranked:
>Andy Fletcher had the highest overturn rate among umpires with more than 100 challenges, getting reversed on 80 of 121 (66.1%), according to taptochallenge.com. Rob Drake was next at 64.6%, followed by Cory Blaser (64.1%), Adrian Johnson (64%), Manny Gonzalez (62.5%) and Mike Estabrook (61.7%).
>Jansen Visconti had the lowest overturn rate among those with triple-figure challenges, reversed on 43 of 102 (42.2%). He was just ahead of Mark Ripperger (44.3%), James Jean (44.9%), Ryan Additon (45%), Nestor Ceja (46%) and Alex Tosi (46.9%).
A few thoughts from me.
First, for people who say we should just get rid of the home plate ump period, the 54 percent overturn rate means that even the apparently most egregious calls aren't. And, you still have to have a home plate ump to call plays at the plate, to call balks, to call catcher's interference trying to grab a pitch early, both interference and obstruction on bunts and squibbers in front of the plate, etc.
Second, could it be tweaked? I'd be comfortable with one more challenge per team. Other people may think of other tweaks.
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Edit: I'm pretty sure everyone knew what I meant, as the ABS system can't overturn calls that aren't challenged.
