The 2024 Major League Baseball season hasn’t even been underway for a month yet, but we have already had no shortage of mistakes from umpires, particularly behind the plate. And we had another brutal mistake this weekend during Saturday’s game between the Kansas City Royals and the Baltimore Orioles.
On the very first pitch of the game, Royals starter Cole Ragans threw a fastball that seemed to go right down the middle of the plate, but home plate umpire Ryan Blakney saw it differently and called the pitch a ball.
It was an absolutely egregious mistake from the umpire, and even the commentators couldn’t help but blast him for it.
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
“Fastball is right down the middle for ball one,” the commentator said.
“What?! My goodness! Not on pitch one!” the other commentator replied.
“What part of that pitch is not a strike?” the first commentator responded.
The commentators weren’t the only ones outraged at the missed call – the MLB world quickly blasted the umpire for such a clear mistake.
Quite the graphic pic.twitter.com/RN84emEmfK
— Kyle Martin (@StrangersAstory) April 21, 2024
Umps are BEGGING for the robots to intervene at this point https://t.co/gxjZdAThJ8
— Kyle Broughton (@KyleBroughton4) April 21, 2024
It seems like umpires are testing to see how bad they can be before getting canned. This is just terrible https://t.co/HBeqOBCV3U
— 🆖 (@NelsonGuevara) April 21, 2024
They really need automated calls in baseball, human error ain't it any more. https://t.co/3NC5bpyuCV
— Jason Lincoln (@VinoFiIipino) April 21, 2024
Bad umpiring seems to be spreading. https://t.co/Mxp72MqEtX
— Dave O'Brien (@DaveOBrienCT) April 22, 2024
Even the broadcasters are struggling with these umpires https://t.co/nXedNVYz5E
— Mike – Elon ruined the bird app (@MikeP0330) April 21, 2024
While it was an egregious error from the umpire, it didn’t actually impact the game or even the at-bat. Following the called ball, Ragans then threw three straight strikes to strike out Orioles’ shortstop Gunnar Henderson to begin the game.
But it was still a horrible call regardless of what happened afterward.
