In this day and age, but especially in 2023, umpiring in Major League Baseball has deteriorated by a ton.
It also hasn't gotten any better in the playoffs.
In Game 4 of the ALCS last night between the Texas Rangers and Houston Astros, the umpiring was especially bad, as home plate umpire Doug Eddings made some very questionable ball and strike calls during the game.
Several pitches that looked to be outside were called strikes, while some that looked to be in the strike zone were called balls. A video of all of Eddings' questionable calls can be seen in the tweet below.
According to the tweet from Umpire Auditor, this was the second-worst performance by an umpire this October. The worst also belongs to Eddings. By this count, Eddings missed 18 calls in total during Game 4.
Houston won the game by a final score of 10-3, evening the ALCS at two games apiece, but both sides got a taste of bad umpiring last night, and each team felt the effects of Eddings' terrible performance.
This will almost certainly re-ignite the debate over whether or not Major League Baseball should attempt to implement an automatic strike zone, programmed to make the correct calls for balls and strikes. Many around the game have been hoping for this change to take place.
But with each poor umpire performance, the debate is revisited. Clearly, Eddings missed a ton of calls during Game 4 on Thursday night, and both the Rangers and Astros felt the effects of such a rough performance from Eddings.
