Bad calls are going to happen. That’s the whole “human” thing about umpires in baseball, and whatever your position on whether the human factor should be reduced (bring on the robot umps!), you can have empathy for how hard their job is. They will make mistakes.
But what you can’t have happening out there is an umpire making a mistake and then compounding his mistake by being WAY TOO itchy with the trigger finger. That’s what happened with Kevin Plawecki, Alex Cora, and home plate ump Adam Beck:
Adam Beck makes a horrible strikeout call against Kevin Plawecki who is ejected as well as his manager. pic.twitter.com/g1RhYT1SyM
— Baseball GIFs (@gifs_baseball) May 12, 2022
What you have there is a batter in a huge spot in a game, having a run taken away (and maybe more) because of what you SHOULD AT LEAST know is a borderline call. Let him blow off a little steam! Instead, Beck immediately tosses Plawecki instead of giving him a little more space and a sterner word of caution. Then, instead of realizing he’s doubled up on mistakes, Beck tosses Cora quickly, too, when the manager had come out to defend his player. Both guys were ejected WITHIN 15 SECONDS of the strike call! That’s just absurd.
And just to be sure, the pitch was one of the lowest I can remember seeing called as a strike recently:
Pitch 7 is the “strike.” Except it wasn’t. Plawecki does his job and lays off a 3-2 pitch below the strike zone. And ump Adam Beck rings him up. Then tosses him. Then tosses Alex Cora.#ROBOTUMPS CAN’T COME SOON ENOUGH. #RedSox pic.twitter.com/mOfs2wm3qV
— Tom Caron (@TomCaron) May 12, 2022
Plawecki was obviously displeased after the game, which the Red Sox lost by two:
Boston Red Sox’s Kevin Plawecki on missed call: ‘It at least cost us one (run). It stinks. Terrible’ https://t.co/Xhp2GOo5VG
— Christopher Smith (@SmittyOnMLB) May 12, 2022