MLB Ejection 106 - Lance Barksdale (1; Kris Bryant)

[Lindsay]

HP Umpire Lance Barksdale ejected Cubs 3B Kris Bryant (called third strike; QOCN) in the bottom of the 4th inning of the White Sox-Cubs game. With one out and one on (R2), Bryant took a 2-2 fastball from White Sox pitcher Carlos Rodón for a called third strike. Replays indicate the pitch was...

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[Cav]

Strike all day long in my games.  I like it.  I like it a lot. I spend a lot more time with a catcher than I do with any hitter. 

[stkjock]

14 minutes ago, Cav said:

Strike all day long in my games.  I like it.  I like it a lot. I spend a lot more time with a catcher than I do with any hitter. 

6" off the plate?

[BrianC14]

36 minutes ago, stkjock said:

6" off the plate?

Two balls on the inside.   Yow.  YOW.

[ElkOil]

2 hours ago, Cav said:

Strike all day long in my games.  I like it.  I like it a lot. I spend a lot more time with a catcher than I do with any hitter. 

That's your strike zone, huh? What happens when the catcher comes to bat? Do you ring him up on a pitch in the batter's box, then spend all of the next half inning chatting with him about it? That must be quite the conversation.

[Stk004]

4 hours ago, Cav said:

Strike all day long in my games.  I like it.  I like it a lot. I spend a lot more time with a catcher than I do with any hitter. 

What age group? At best this pitch is 5" inside, which is probably kissing the inside line of the batters box. 

[Cav]

12 hours ago, stkjock said:

6" off the plate?

I didn't see it that way.  I can't decipher (px -1.350, pz 2.842) and I have little confidence in the display.

11 hours ago, BrianC14 said:

Two balls on the inside.   Yow.  YOW.

Over the plate or when caught? 

10 hours ago, ElkOil said:

That's your strike zone, huh? What happens when the catcher comes to bat? Do you ring him up on a pitch in the batter's box, then spend all of the next half inning chatting with him about it? That must be quite the conversation.

I presume you're interested in my zone width: It's as close to 23" wide as I can make and keep it.  I hope yours is too. 

Any number of things happen when a catcher comes to bat. 

I try never to ring up any hitter on a pitch in the box.  I'm guessing you, too, are good enough to avoid doing so.

I've had some interesting conversations with catchers.  I believe, based on anecdotal evidence, that catchers, as a group, make better umpires than other current or former players.       

7 hours ago, Stk004 said:

What age group? At best this pitch is 5" inside, which is probably kissing the inside line of the batters box. 

HS and up.

LH-er Rodon's release point is maybe 12-24" to the 1B side of the pitcher's plate.  Smarter people than me can come up with the trajectory of his heater, but I'm declaring that pitch was one that I would strike in my games and a good hitter, already with 2 strikes, would be swinging at, even if it were to just waste it.  And, Bryant as a hitter is fully capable of all that and more.  Perhaps that was the catalyst for his uncharacteristic outburst.  

I tracked the pitched ball by frame (about 6 total) from release point (@0:03) to F2's glove (#0:04).  Perhaps you may wish to try it.    

Back to real time: Strike three!      

 

[stkjock]

53 minutes ago, Cav said:

I didn't see it that way.  I can't decipher (px -1.350, pz 2.842) and I have little confidence in the display.

 

no need to decipher - Gill does it in the article.

 

Quote

*Pitch was 6.212 inches off the inner edge of home plate (-1.350 + Radius_Ball = -1.226 + .708 = .518 * 12 = 6.212). MOE brings pitch no closer than 5"+ from inner edge.

 

 

and at 23" your zone is at least a 1/4" to big  

[scrounge]

There's no way that pitch was as inside as the tv box made it appear to be. The moniker I have chosen has absolutely nothing to do with my credibility on this matter. 

[stkjock]

here's my very rudimentary post mordum on the call.

 

look at the red circle at Bryant's feet, that's the shadow of the ball, the sun is to Bryant's back, throwing shadows towards home. the shadow of the ball is clear of the inner corner of the plate, which IMHO, means the ball is even more off the plate.

 

 

[Cav]

2 hours ago, stkjock said:

no need to decipher - Gill does it in the article. 

and at 23" your zone is at least a 1/4" to big  

Someday, you should ask about my 1/2" strike zone that I used to call (indeed admonished to call by some pretty good mentors in the day) during a blowout game. 

2 hours ago, stkjock said:

here's my very rudimentary post mordum on the call.  look at the red circle at Bryant's feet, that's the shadow of the ball, the sun is to Bryant's back, throwing shadows towards home. the shadow of the ball is clear of the inner corner of the plate, which IMHO, means the ball is even more off the plate.

 

 

I'm not so sure the shadow you mentioned above is the ball, but I am pretty sure that the thin shadow just above it (towards F2; Narvaez?) is the catcher's glove.  On initial contact with the ball and F2's glove, the glove's shadow is still in line near the inside corner.  And, given the trajectory from the lefty's release point, I have strike three.      

[stkjock]

I'm certain it's the ball, I watched the video multiple times, pausing it at least 10x to make sure, I saw the shadow move with the ball.

[udbrky]

According to Gill and brooksbaseball, it was. The PitchFx data (not the TV box - which WGN and CSN have one of the more accurate ones I've seen) shows it's inside. 

[Lindsay]

Rudimentary, not to scale diagram.

[beerguy55]

4 hours ago, Cav said:

I didn't see it that way.  I can't decipher (px -1.350, pz 2.842) and I have little confidence in the display.

See it any way you want, factually speaking it's at least 5 inches off the plate, and probably over 6.   Fear the technology all you want.

If you want to give six inches give it on the outside, not the inside.

4 hours ago, Cav said:

I presume you're interested in my zone width: It's as close to 23" wide as I can make and keep it.  I hope yours is too.

Yes, 23 inches INCLUDING the ball.  Unless your strike zone is from the outside of the plate to two balls on the inside of the plate this pitch doesn't fit into a 23 inch strike zone...this is a 29 inch strike zone.

 

4 hours ago, Cav said:

Smarter people than me can come up with the trajectory of his heater, but I'm declaring that pitch was one that I would strike in my games and a good hitter, already with 2 strikes, would be swinging at, even if it were to just waste it. 

It's difficult enough to hit as it is - this inside pitch off the plate is as difficult a pitch there is to get a piece of.  And Bryant can handle an inside pitch.

 

54 minutes ago, Cav said:

I'm not so sure the shadow you mentioned above is the ball, but I am pretty sure that the thin shadow just above it

It's absolutely the shadow of the ball.  The shadow you're referencing is the catcher's mitt.

 

4 hours ago, Cav said:

I try never to ring up any hitter on a pitch in the box.

This pitch was in the box - it's going along the line of the batter's box under Bryant's elbows.

[ElkOil]

4 hours ago, Cav said:

I presume you're interested in my zone width: It's as close to 23" wide as I can make and keep it.  I hope yours is too. 

No, mine is not that wide. Yes, I can make adjustments for the level of ball, but unless the pitching is atrocious, it's never batter's box to batter's box. And when I umpire men's league, if the pitchers are collegiate or former AAA, they get a zone as defined in the book.

[BrianC14]

3 hours ago, stkjock said:

here's my very rudimentary post mordum on the call.

 

look at the red circle at Bryant's feet, that's the shadow of the ball, the sun is to Bryant's back, throwing shadows towards home. the shadow of the ball is clear of the inner corner of the plate, which IMHO, means the ball is even more off the plate.

 

 

Still pics are nice, but watching the video, you see F2 set up well inside, then move the mitt slightly farther inside, then tweak it back.   Even with that last tweak, that pitch is in the batter's box.    How would anyone get the bat on it, when it's darn near tickling the batter's toes?   

[Stk004]

1 minute ago, ElkOil said:

No, mine is not that wide. Yes, I can make adjustments for the level of ball, but unless the pitching is atrocious, it's never batter's box to batter's box. And when I umpire men's league, if the pitchers are collegiate or former AAA, they get a zone as defined in the book.

I'd like to work your level of ball where batters box to batters box isn't a reasonable zone. 

Hey @Gil , or anyone else that knows, is the 6" from plate to batters box to the inside edge of the line, outside edge, or middle of the line? 

[Lindsay]

2 minutes ago, Stk004 said:

I'd like to work your level of ball where batters box to batters box isn't a reasonable zone. 

Hey @Gil , or anyone else that knows, is the 6" from plate to batters box to the inside edge of the line, outside edge, or middle of the line? 

Outermost edge. Because the lines of the batters box are considered part of the box themselves, the entirety of the line is considered in the box, and the distance from home plate to the beginning of the batter's box is 6".

[ElkOil]

Just now, Stk004 said:

I'd like to work your level of ball where batters box to batters box isn't a reasonable zone. 

Men's league and varsity HS mostly. Bad teams and younger players, pitchers who lack control... they get a bigger zone. Everyone has their own zone, I suppose, and this has served me well so far.

[beerguy55]

2 minutes ago, Stk004 said:

I'd like to work your level of ball where batters box to batters box isn't a reasonable zone. 

Hey @Gil , or anyone else that knows, is the 6" from plate to batters box to the inside edge of the line, outside edge, or middle of the line? 

Outside of line when talking about the box itself (theoretically).  The box ends/begins six inches from the plate, and anything on the chalk is "inside" that batter's box.

[Stk004]

2 minutes ago, ElkOil said:

Men's league and varsity HS mostly. Bad teams and younger players, pitchers who lack control... they get a bigger zone. Everyone has their own zone, I suppose, and this has served me well so far.

A lot of it could be the quality of the age group too. Baseball in my area isn't the best but sometimes you get a HS team that has amazing command, and then you turn around and the next team can't get it within shouting distance of the zone. 

[ElkOil]

54 minutes ago, Stk004 said:

A lot of it could be the quality of the age group too. Baseball in my area isn't the best but sometimes you get a HS team that has amazing command, and then you turn around and the next team can't get it within shouting distance of the zone. 

Ain't that the truth. For some reason this year, I've been assigned mostly Men's games. The 18 year old division has some excellent pitching and I get spoiled because it's so easy to call their games.

[beerguy55]

19 hours ago, Cav said:

Strike all day long in my games.  I like it.  I like it a lot. 

You and Eric Gregg.

[Cav]

30 minutes ago, beerguy55 said:

You and Eric Gregg.

I wouldn't last 25 minutes umpiring in the National League, let alone 25 years as he did.  RIP Big Guy. 

Speaking of which, I'm going to put this thread to rest on my end.  Nothing I can say or do will change our opinions of Barksdale's call.