On Thu, Jan 16, 2014 at 1:53 PM, Joe Hass <[email protected]> wrote:

> You're one of those "human element" people, eh?
>
> (pulls out old-fashioned pocket spiral notebook, opens it, leafs to a
> particular page, makes a small mark, closes notebook, puts back in pocket)
>

I see I have made it into your book.

I am, but not in the sense of celebrating mistakes because they make the
game more human. There are always steps that can be taken to reduce
officiating mistakes. But relying on technology to officiate takes the game
out of the level at which they are played, which trivializes and alienates
it. We may be able to super slo mo the hard hit grounder down the third
base line, zoom in and 360 exactly where the ball first hits the ground,
and determine that the ump's call of foul was "wrong" because at 1 fame per
10 seconds, magnified 10,000 times, we can see that one atom of the ball is
actually making contact with one atom of chalk. But that atomic level has
nothing to do with how the game is played, viewed or enjoyed at the human
level. That is an artificial level of scrutiny that gives rise to a false
sense of confidence in the absolute accuracy of the game. Does a replay at
regular speed clearly show that the batter was a full step ahead of the
ball at first base? I don't mind letting the umps look at that and using it
to change an erroneous out call. But anything else is self-delusion.

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