{"id":20338,"date":"2025-09-24T06:04:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-24T06:04:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=20338"},"modified":"2025-09-24T06:04:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-24T06:04:07","slug":"mlb-approves-robot-umpires-for-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=20338","title":{"rendered":"MLB approves ‘robot umpires’ for 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"
‘Robot umpires’ will debut in Major League Baseball in the 2026 season as the game adopts the automated strike zone challenge system tested in the 2025 pre-season, MLB announced on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

MLB’s joint competition committee voted to approve the Automated Ball-Strike (ABS) Challenge System, which allows players to challenge human umpires’ ball and strike calls via an electronic system run by the Hawk-Eye technology already widely used in sports such as tennis.<\/p>\n

The system had already been widely tested in the minor leagues before being tried in 2025 pre-season games.<\/p>\n

In 2026, MLB teams will be able to challenge two calls per game and get additional appeals in extra innings.<\/p>\n

Only a pitcher, catcher or batter can challenge, without input from managers or players in the dugout.<\/p>\n

Reviews will be shown as digital graphics on outfield video scoreboards.<\/p>\n

Based on the system’s use during spring training games, MLB reckons that challenges take an average of 13.8 seconds. If a challenge is successful, the team retains that challenge.<\/p>\n

Umpires have been declaring pitches in or out of the strike zone since the birth of the sport in the 1800s with plenty of disputes and argued calls since then.<\/p>\n

MLB said in a statement Tuesday that the two-challenge system will be a “middle ground between so-called ‘robot umps’ that could call every ball and strike and the long-standing tradition of the natural human error that comes with human umps”.<\/p>\n

But it noted that the change will mark “the first instance within the championship season at the game’s highest level in which the home-plate umpire’s ball-strike calls will not be ironclad”.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

‘Robot umpires’ will debut in Major League Baseball in the 2026 season as the game adopts the automated strike zone challenge system tested in the 2025 pre-season, MLB announced on Tuesday. MLB’s joint competition committee voted to approve the Automated Ball-Strike (ABS) Challenge System, which allows players to challenge human umpires’ ball and strike calls […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20338","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20338","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20338"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20338\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}