The Major League Baseball 2024 season has seen its fair share of bad calls made by umpires; however, during one of the recent games between the Kansas City Royals and the Baltimore Orioles, another faulty call was made by umpire Ryan Blakney.
The Kauffman Stadium during the game between Kansas City and Orioles saw Blakney as the home plate umpire and Cole Ragans, Kansas City pitcher, threw a 96-mph fastball to Orioles’ Gunnar Henderson, which was right down the middle.
The first pitch of Saturday's Orioles-Royals game, right after Bally Sports Kansas City introduces the umpiring crew….
"Fastball is right down the middle for ball one."
"What?! My goodness! Not on pitch one!"
"What part of that pitch is not a strike?" ⚾️👮♂️🎙️ pic.twitter.com/gsknnwkNUc
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) April 21, 2024
The umpire, Blakney, called it a ball, which drew immediate reactions from the Baltimore Orioles broadcast crew. Ryan Lefebvre, who was calling the game for the Kansas City Royals on Bally Sports Kansas City, shared, “Fastball is right down the middle for ball one.”
To which analyst Rex Hudler replied while laughing, “What? My goodness. Not on pitch one.”
And Lefebvre replied, “What part of that pitch was not a strike?”
Quite the graphic pic.twitter.com/RN84emEmfK
— Kyle Martin (@StrangersAstory) April 21, 2024
this is going to speed up robot umpires, unfortunately.
— Dean Millard 🏒🦆🎙 (@DuckMillard) April 21, 2024
Who’s the home plate umpire? Is it Angel Hernandez???
— Seth Zimmerman (@SethZimmer52307) April 21, 2024
It's not even comical anymore, it's sad. Baseball has a crisis here, and they don't even realize it.
— Greg Taylor (@GregTay66) April 21, 2024
Umps are BEGGING for the robots to intervene at this point https://t.co/gxjZdAThJ8
— Kyle Broughton (@KyleBroughton4) April 21, 2024
I remember a time when a belt high fastball was the perfect pitch to hit. Now it’s not even a strike.
— Christopher Poling (@crtr01) April 21, 2024
The baseball community also gave their opinions, as the faulty call attracted a lot of attention.
