MLB’s Instant Replay Debut

Every baseball fan looks forward to Opening Day, the day where you call in sick to attend the game and beer and team apparel rule. This day symbolizes the beginning of what most fans think is their teams year to hoist the World Series Trophy.  But today also marked the dawn of a new era in baseball which for so long was frowned upon in the sport: Instant Replay. 

On the first day of its inception we saw two challenges in the game featuring the Cubs and Pirates. Jeff Samardzija was called out at first on a double play.  The call was upheld after two minutes of review. Later in the same game Pirates manager Clint Hurdle was successful in getting a pick off at first call reversed after 2 1/2 minutes of review.  In the Brewers-Braves game Ryan Braun was called safe on an infield single but the call was overturned after 58 seconds of review.  This went down as the first overturned call in the instant replay era.  During the National-Mets game a challenge was upheld on a bang-bang play at first base. And finally during the Indians-Athletics game Mike Winters became the first umpire to review a call at home plate for a catcher illegally blocking the plate. The call was upheld after replay showed John Jaso tagged Michael Brantley and had not illegally blocked the plate. The replay only took 59 seconds.

With so much controversy about instant replay slowing the game down no replay took longer than 2 1/2 minutes.  With this new system getting it right was the sentiment echoed by both players and managers during today’s debut of instant replay and getting it right is what Major League Baseball did with the introduction of instant replay.