As you may know, MLB will use an automated ball-strike system in nearly all games this season. Teams only get two of these in the first nine innings of a game, which isn’t nearly enough. If an umpire misses less than five ball-strike calls in a game, it’s a very good effort. So they probably have a strategy for using their challenges. They will need one to use it effectively. We already know how Chris Sale feels on the subject. He’s borrowing a page from a Braves pitcher from yesteryear.
I feel that emotion and it may play into what the Braves want to do. He’s going to (A) let the catcher to decide on a close call and (B) bank those calls for later in the game. What I think you want to avoid from a pitching standpoint is having a third strike being called a ball and having it immediately hurt you. Did the Braves benefit from this situation last year? Yes, twice it happened where the Braves hit a home run. This is Drake Baldwin on the Fourth of July.
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The second was Matt Olson on September 26. Statcast had this a ball, but it didn’t appear egregious.
And on the next pitch:
The Braves had 88 third strikes called a ball. They yielded two home runs. If you think you have the hitter struck out, that would be a good time to ask. 88 times over the course of a year would be 27% of your challenges. But that’s if you spot every error. In reality, your odds of overturning may be closer to a coin flip. So that’s over half your challenges. I would run the query the other way (Braves pitching versus opponent hitting) but it’s a tougher task. That is, until I can quit being lazy and fully upgrade my data collection.
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Notice here that we’re not considering the game’s leverage here. In a close game late, a challenged third strike feels like a given. But trying to grab an out, whenever you can get, it seems like a good idea too. What we’re also not doing is considering how the Braves use innings and score instead of leverage when it comes to bullpen selection, and that might extend to this as well.
There’s lots more to consider. But there’s 400 of my words. So how will the Braves employ ABS this season? I yield back the balance of my digital ink to the commentariat.
