GIRARDI PARTY REPLAY PARTY

Why does baseball always have to be this mythical, unchanging cousin of the other major sports? While the NCAA, NFL, NHL, and NBA (and what the hell, even NASCAR) have instituted numerous rule changes over the last decade or so to improve the quality of their respective games and help keep them with the times, baseball's biggest rule changes of the last ten years have been reactionary subtleties aimed to quell the rioting masses: the All-Star Game can't end in a tie, and first- and third-base coaches need to wear helmets. Baseball simply refuses to join the new millennium and implement instant-replay, and the rationale can be summed up in one word...


"TRADITION!"

Traditionalists, such as my friend Marthur, argue that instituting replay in baseball would interrupt the flow of the game, making games drag on too long. I don't know what type of replay these guys are picturing. The idea, in my humble opinion, isn't that every close call be meticulously dissected and reviewed. I agree that doing that won't do wonders to speed up an already somewhat slow-moving game. At the same time, though, a responsible and somewhat minimalist approach to instant replay could keep fans and franchises happy by guaranteeing that the right call has been made while also insuring that the sacred "flow" of baseball is preserved.


Here's how it has to go. I present GIRARDI PARTY REPLAY PARTY.

• As the MLB has proposed for this season, close/questionable home run/foul ball calls will always be reviewed, without provocation or use of a "challenge", from some kind of Batcave war room in MLB's secret fortress in New York. In the event of a tough home run call, a call would be placed from the Batcave to the ballpark in question, where a representative would inform the umpires that the call is being reviewed. The crew chief would simply wait on the phone until the verdict is reached, and the game progresses as normal.
  
  
• If you say this will add significant time to games, you're wrong. These calls really aren't all that common, and when there are close home run calls, the umpires always huddle and take 10 minutes deciding anyway. I think a team of trained professionals - or chimpanzees - studying the tape in HD could get the call right more quickly and efficiently than four umpires scratching their heads and asking each other, "I dunno, did you see it?"
  
  
• The part everyone gets hung up on is, "well, when does it end? What's stopping them from reviewing every close call?" Here's what's stopping them: a rule preventing that. In Girardi Party Replay Party, in addition to home run/foul calls automatically being reviewed, each team is allowed one "challenge" per game, where a call is reviewed by instant replay. To "challenge," a manager would have to immediately leave the dugout and inform an umpire exactly what ruling he's challenging. I don't know if the umpires would look into a TV at the park to make a ruling or what... I like the Batcave idea for all challenges. (A comprehensive list is of what would/wouldn't be reviewable is at the bottom of this post.)
  
  
• Win or lose a challenge, each team gets one and only one. This provision is key because it is what will keep replay from being a major distraction. Think about it: a manager would never blow his challenge on a play at first in a scoreless game with no men on in the third inning because he'll look like an idiot when his team loses on a clearly trapped-and-not-caught line drive at the end of the game. With only one crack at a replay, challenges won't be used except in extreme and crucial circumstances, and entire games would likely pass in which teams would not use their challenges at all.
  
  
• While there would be no penalty for losing a challenge (as in the NFL, where you lose a timeout), losing your only chance at a replay review is punishment enough.
  
  
• The only fishy part about this is determining what would have happened in the event that, say, the challenged call on the field was the third out of the inning but was overturned. The umpires then would have to have final say on which baserunners move up, and where - a decision that would not be reviewable but would probably be pretty obvious, assuming no errors (which you'd have to).
  
  
• As in football, if the replay were inconclusive, the call on the field would stand.
  

Some of the world's snootiest, oldest sports have adopted instant replay - cricket and tennis come to mind. While concerns over the pace of the game are certainly valid, if home runs were automatically reviewed and each team were only allowed one challenge, the pace of the game would not be changed dramatically. In fact, the game's pace would probably be more positively impacted by other rules, such as a tighter regulations on warm-up pitches, mound visits, pitchers' pace of play, and time-outs by batters. Nobody wants a baseball game to resemble a football game, where the replays are long and boring and challenges have become the game's focal point. The idea would be to introduce replay to get big calls right but still keep it a small, subtle part of baseball. I think Girardi Party Replay Party accomplishes this, and to further prove it, a more detailed analysis of what would and wouldn't be reviewable follows:

Things that could be reviewed:

• Balls in play caught/not caught
  
• Baserunners out/safe by way of tag or force (or lack thereof)
  
• Baserunners tagging up (in)correctly
  
• Batters hit by a pitch (or not), or catcher interference (or not)
  
• Ground rule doubles; ie, did the ball bounce and hit the wall, or some other object that is out of play?
  
• Catchers (not) catching third strikes - call this one the AJ Pierzynski Rule
  
• Other oddities (fan interference, baserunners crossing paths, baserunners touching coaches/other players, missed bases, catcher leaving the catcher's box prior to pitch, etc.)

Things that would be left solely to the discretion of the umpires:

• Called balls and strikes, no matter how egregious
  
• Balks
  
• Checked swings; normal checked-swing appeals will suffice, and will not count as challenges, but such decisions are final and cannot be challenged
  
• Out by batting out of order (as these calls are made only by appeal anyway and aren't really debatable)
  
• Home runs/foul balls - these replays can come only "from the booth Batcave" and will every time it's even close, no matter what, quickly and efficiently
  
• Suspension/postponement/ending of a game due to weather

Editor's Note: It's too bad that Marthur has disassociated himself with this blog, because he could provide a passionate counter-argument to my point of view. I know this because he did already, half-drunk in a stifling-hot dorm room in Columbus, Ohio a few weeks ago. Nothing better than seeing two co-bloggers call each other assholes.