Get ready for the experiments in spring training 2025, as MLB has announced automated ball-strike systems will be tested at 13 ballparks, affected 19 home teams.
Honing automated ball-strike (ABS) systems has been a prime goal for Rob Manfred and crew for several years now, tested at various levels of Minor League Baseball since 2019. The systems certainly have improved over time, and while similar technology has been featured in other sports (tennis, primarily), it has been slow to gain acceptance in Major League Baseball. The issue isn’t necessarily the technology, but rather the challenge of tracking pitches on an ever-changing palette. Using technology to track tennis play is easy in one respect: the lines on the court are fixed.
But the strike zone is an ever-changing entity in baseball. Players crouch and move around the batters’ box. In addition, though the strike zone is defined in the rule book, it’s not necessarily interpreted on a consistent basis by every umpire, much less managers and players viewing from the dugout.
That’s why the proposed MLB automated ball-strike system comes with a slew of asterisks and outs. First, manager will be allowed challenges (number to be determined), with another umpire making a final determination). Second, to happen, MLB owners would first need to approve the move, followed by umpires and players, whose unions will need to sign off. From AP:
“I would be interested in having it in ‘26,” baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred said Wednesday after an owners’ meeting. “We do have a collective bargaining obligation there. That’s obviously a term and condition of employment. We’re going to have to work through that issue, as well.”
Manfred said the spring training experiment will have to be evaluated before MLB determines how to move forward.
“There’s two sides to that test,” he said. “It’s what the clubs think about it and also what do the players think about it? And we’re going to have to sort through both of those.”
If everyone signs off after a successful test in spring training 2025, the negotiations with interested parties will proceed.
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