Villar, Luciano, Schmitt lead big night of dingers!

SF Giants Minor Lines, May 18, 2022

This week started the Triple A experiment with the Automated Ball-Strike system, officially known as ABS and colloquially known as “robo-umps.”

The play by play announcer for the Albuquerque Isotopes put out a long thread on Twitter yesterday detailing his first night experience. The entire thing is too long to post here, but you can click on the first tweet to see the entire thread.

Josh Suchon @Josh_Suchon

Last night was the debut of the Automated Ball Strike (ABS) system in the Pacific Coast League. First thought: if you didn't know the umpire had an earpiece telling him ball/strike, it's doubtful you would know. Here's a thread:

For those of you who like things bottom lined: it was mostly invisible. And that was the experience I had watching the River Cats game as well — if you didn’t know they were using ABS, you wouldn’t have picked up on it from anything that happened during the game. And, if you believe that ABS will end ball-strike arguments, well:

Josh Suchon @Josh_Suchon

Were players upset at borderline calls? Of course. That's normal. This is Alan Trejo's at-bat in the 9th inning. The second pitch clipped the strike zone by millimeters and was called a strike. I instinctively called it a ball on the air, and had to correct myself.

But hopefully, it will smooth out the most egregious misses (yep, I’m thinking of one ump in particular). Of course, now I’m thinking of this bit of wisdom I just saw in a museum exhibit last week:

Roger Munter @rog61

#LaurieAnderson

HITTER of the Night: Aeverson Arteaga (SJ), 4 for 5, BB, 3 R, 3 RBI
PITCHER of the Night: Manuel Mercedes (SJ), 3.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K