MLB’s New Replay System: A Breakdown of Plays So Far

Well well well, MLB has a new replay system set up for every game of this year. Some people – although I would say most – are not too fond of this new system, myself included. They would say that it slows down an already slow enough game, which is true. The way the system is structured allows managers to be exploitative by confirming with their bench to see whether or not it the call should be challenged. This part of the process is what really gets me. Granted I haven’t seen too many games this year but already I miss the arguments between managers/coaches and the umpires; they were fun and made the game pretty interesting (especially when the manager of the team playing against yours got ejected). Regardless, this post is not intended to analyse the dynamics between managers and umpires but rather look at how successful the replay system has been and to examine the tendencies of the challenges. Using the twitter account @MLBReplays I examined all of the calls challenged so far this season. While the sample size is arguably small it did take quite a long time to examine various angles from the 49 calls made (as of the morning of April 9th 2014). For each replay I collected the following information which I then organized into a spreadsheet:

• Date: MM-DD-YYYY (used for future reference and look-ups)
• Challenger: Which team challenged the call
• Challenged: The team that was under challenge and who’s player would be affected
• Ump: Yes/No (did the umpires initiate the challenge themselves? This was rare but did happen in some odd situations)
• Player Involved: Player Name (player which was the centre of the challenged play)
• Inning: The inning in which the challenge occurred  (this could be used to determine if more challenges were made in earlier or later innings)
• Result: Confirmed – Out Stands/Confirmed – Call Stands/Overturned – Out Added/Overturned – Out Retracted/Overturned – No Runs (this is where it may get confusing and I will explain each category below)
• Location: 1/2/3/4/Outfield/Foul Ball/Count (where the play happened, numbers correspond to bases, Outfield corresponds to the outfield, Foul balls correspond to foul lines, Count corresponds to one unique situation during an at-bat
• Pickoff: Yes/No (was the play a pickoff at a base?)
• Plate: Yes/No (was the play at the plate regarding the new rules for catchers?)

Right, so after that lengthy process I will quickly explain the Result portion of the methods.

Confirmed – Out Stands: This call was challenged and the original call that was made stands, the player involved was out

Confirmed – Call Stands: This call was challenged however the original call that was made stands and the player in question is safe

Overturned – Out Added: The challenge was successful and upon reviewing the replay the umpires overturned their original call and the player in question is out. When these calls are made this is almost always the challenging manager’s desired outcome

Overturned – Out Retracted: The player in question who was originally out is now ruled safe

Overturned – No Runs: This happened once in the 49 replays so far this year and the original call that lead to run(s) being scored was overturned and those runs removed

Now that the definitions of each category are out of the way I can provide the data in a table for your viewing enjoyment! Following the table is my analysis of the results and some quick number crunching to see what has been happening so far with the replays.

Date	Challenger	Challenged	Ump	Player Involved	Inning	Result	Location	Pickoff	Plate
3/31/2014	Cubs	Pirates	No	Jeff Samardzija	Top 5th	Confirmed – Out Stands	1	No	No
3/31/2014	Braves	Brewers	No	Ryan Braun	Bot 6th	Overturned – Out Added	1	No	No
3/31/2014	Pirates	Cubs	No	Emilio Bonifacio	Top 10th	Overturned – Out Added	1	Yes	No
3/31/2014	Nationals	Mets	No	Danny Espinosa	Top 10th	Confirmed – Out Stands	1	No	No
4/1/2014	Umpires	Athletics	Yes	John Jaso	Top 6th	Confirmed – Out Stands	4	No	Yes
4/1/2014	Rangers	Phillies	No	Ben Revere	Top 6th	Overturned – Out Added	2	Yes	No
4/1/2014	Umpires	Blue Jays	Yes	Melky Cabrera	Top 9th	Confirmed – Out Stands	1	No	No
4/1/2014	Giants	Diamondbacks	No	AJ Pollock	Bot 4th	Confirmed – Call Stands	1	Yes	No
4/2/2014	Tigers	Royals	No	Tyler Collins	Bot 6th	Overturned – Out Retracted	1	No	No
4/2/2014	Tigers	Royals	No	Norichika Aoki	Top 10th	Overturned – Out Added	1	No	No
4/2/2014	Twins	White Sox	No	Adam Eaton	Top 7th	Overturned – Out Retracted	Outfield	No	No
4/2/2014	Athletics	Indians	No	Yan Gomes	Bot 2nd	Confirmed – Out Stands	4	No	Yes
4/2/2014	Marlins	Rockies	No	Jordan Pacheco	Top 4th	Confirmed – Call Stands	2	No	No
4/2/2014	Cubs	Pirates	No	Anthony Rizzo	Top 8th	Overturned – Out Retracted	2	No	No
4/2/2014	Pirates	Cubs	No	Starlin Marte	Bot 8th	Confirmed – Call Stands	Foul Ball	No	No
4/2/2014	Indians	Athletics	No	Mike Aviles	Top 6th	Overturned – Out Retracted	2	No	No
4/3/2014	Cubs	Pirates	No	Pedro Alvarez	Bot 13th	Confirmed – Call Stands	3	No	No
4/3/2014	Rockies	Marlins	No	Marcell Ozuna	Bot 3rd	Confirmed – Call Stands	1	No	No
4/3/2014	Rockies	Marlins	No	Christian Yelich	Bot 8th	Confirmed – Call Stands	2	No	No
4/3/2014	Umpires	Reds	Yes	Matt Holliday	Top 7th	Confirmed – Call Stands	Outfield	No	No
4/3/2014	Umpires	Umpires	Yes	Yangervis Solarte	Top 9th	Confirmed – Call Stands	Count	No	No
4/4/2014	Athletics	Seattle	No	Mike Zunino	Bot 5th	Confirmed – Out Stands	4	No	Yes
4/4/2014	Braves	Nationals	No	Ian Desmond	Bot 5th	Overturned – No Runs	Outfield	No	No
4/4/2014	Tigers	Orioles	No	Austin Romine	Bot 5th	Confirmed – Call Stands	2	No	No
4/4/2014	Royals	White Sox	No	Jose Abreu	Top 7th	Confirmed – Call Stands	1	No	No
4/4/2014	Giants	Dodgers	No	Hanley Ramirez	Bot 7th	Overturned – Out Added	2	No	No
4/4/2014	Yankees	Blue Jays	No	Ichiro Suzuki	Top 3rd	Overturned – Out Retracted	1	No	No
4/4/2014	Rays	Rangers	No	Will Myers	Top 7th	Overturned – Out Added	Outfield	No	No
4/4/2014	Yankees	Blue Jays	No	Jacoby Ellsbury	Top 8th	Confirmed – Out Stands	1	No	No
4/5/2014	Umpires	Blue Jays	Yes	Josh Thole	Top 3rd	Confirmed – Out Stands	4	No	Yes
4/5/2014	Mets	Reds	No	Juan Lagares	Bot 9th	Overturned – Out Retracted	2	No	No
4/5/2014	Dodgers	Giants	No	A.J. Ellis	Bot 7th	Confirmed – Out Stands	4	No	No
4/5/2014	Rays	Rangers	No	Robinson Chirinos	Top 2nd	Overturned – Out Added	1	No	No
4/6/2014	Nationals	Braves	No	Ian Desmond	Bot 1st	Confirmed – Out Stands	1	No	No
4/6/2014	Red Sox	Brewers	No	Jackie Bradley Jr.	Bot 2nd	Confirmed – Out Stands	1	No	No
4/6/2014	Blue Jays	Yankees	No	Ichiro Suzuki	Top 6th	Confirmed – Call Stands	2	No	No
4/6/2014	Royals	White Sox	No	Marcus Semien	Top 6th	Overturned – Out Added	1	No	No
4/6/2014	Phillies	Cubs	No	Chase Utley	Top 5th	Confirmed – Out Stands	1	No	No
4/6/2014	Rockies	Diamondbacks	No	Charlie Blackmon	Bot 1st	Overturned – Out Retracted	1	No	No
4/6/2014	Indians	Twins	No	Trevor Plouffe	Top 9th	Confirmed – Call Stands	4	No	No
4/6/2014	Athletics	Mariners	No	Sam Fuld	Bot 4th	Confirmed – Out Stands	1	No	No
4/6/2014	White Sox	Royals	No	Eric Hosmer	Bot 6th	Confirmed – Call Stands	1	No	No
4/7/2014	Umpires	Athletics	Yes	Jed Lowrie	Bot 3rd	Confirmed – Call Stands	Foul Ball	No	No
4/7/2014	Rangers	Red Sox	No	Daniel Nava	Bot 1st	Confirmed – Call Stands	2	No	No
4/8/2014	Rays	Royals	No	Ben Zobrist	Bot 3rd	Confirmed – Call Stands	2	No	No
4/8/2014	Astros	Blue Jays	No	L.J. Hoes	Top 8th	Confirmed – Out Stands	4	No	Yes
4/8/2014	Mets	Braves	No	Juan Lagares	Top 8th	Overturned – Out Retracted	1	No	No
4/8/2014	Mariners	Angels	No	Josh Hamilton	Bot 5th	Overturned – Out Retracted	Outfield	No	No
4/8/2014	Tigers	Dodgers	No	Victor Martinez	Bot 9th	Confirmed – Out Stands	2	No	No

Now I know it isn’t the prettiest chart but damn it took me a long time and I am proud of it! As you can probably tell I’m not incredibly savvy with putting tables into WordPress posts but I try brother. Anyways, through this data we can conclude a number of interesting things.

First, I’m going to throw a few statistics at you; whether or not you find meaning in these as up to you, considering the sample size. As an initial note the only players that appeared more than one time in a replay challenge were Ian Desmond, Ichiro Suzuki, and Juan Lagares.

Location	#	%
Plays at 1st	21	42.86%
Plays at 2nd	12	24.49%
Plays at 3rd	1	2.04%
Plays at Home	7	14.29%
Play in Outfield	5	10.2%
Foul Ball Plays	2	4.08%
Play at Count	1	2.04%

Inning	#	%
1	3	6.12%
2	3	6.12%
3	5	10.2%
4	3	6.12%
5	6	12.24%
6	8	16.33%
7	6	12.24%
8	6	12.24%
9	5	10.2%
10	3	6.12%
11	0	0%
12	0	0%
13	1	2.04%

Location	#	%
Pickoffs	2	4.08%
Plate	5	10.2%

Result	#	%
Overturned	18	36.73%
Confirmed	31	63.27%

Out of all teams, the majority of challenges came from the Umpires* themselves (12.24%) followed by the Tigers (8.16%), and the Rays, A’s, Cubs, and Rockies (6.12%). This in particular is because of the small sample sizes but there were in fact seven teams who have not yet challenged a play. However, these numbers will obviously change as the season wears on. 36% of calls were overturned and 63% of calls confirmed, again sample sizes, but maybe not. It will be interesting to see if these percentages change throughout the season or stay more or less the same.

While it seems that the majority of plays occur at 1st and 2nd base – as one may have imagined – the new collision rules at home plate make it the third highest challenged area. If I’m not beating the point to death already, due to small samples, most plays have so far occurred in the middle innings, whereas I expected them to occur in greater numbers after the 7th. This is probably due to the specific situations occurring during each game. If there are runners on or it is a tight game I’m guessing there is more likely to be a challenge.

To conclude, the goal of this article was not to put undying faith in the stats on replays in the first 10 days or so of the season. I realize the flaws in assessing the replays so early, however my hope is that it fuels interest for further research on the subject. I could have included the leverage of each situation in the initial table as well as other details (runners on, score, etc.) but perhaps someone else can undertake that endeavour. If anyone does, I know compiling all the data is pretty time consuming so if you want, send me a message on Twitter (@MarkWill_) and I can send you the Excel file. Lastly, this is my first FanGraphs post and as such I welcome any feedback you guys have, hopefully you enjoyed reading my article as much as I enjoyed writing it.

*Note: What a team indeed