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And you think you had a tough day at the office.
One umpire had five calls consecutively overturned by the automated ball-strike challenge system during Tuesday’s Pirates-Red Sox Grapefruit League spring training game in Fort Myers, Fla.
Home plate umpire Mitch Trzeciak must have been red in the face when a number of his calls were challenged and overturned. But he later earned himself a sarcastic cheer when one call was upheld by ABS.
It started in the first inning when Pirates catcher Endy Rodriguez challenged a ball call on a pitch from Carmen Mlodzinski, and the ABS review very clearly showed the ball was a strike and went essentially right down the middle.
NESN play-by-play man Tom Caron couldn’t help but point out the obvious error by saying, “And that one, kind of right down the middle.”
Caron continued to point out the rough day that Trzeciak was having during the broadcast.
“You’ve missed two, and one was right down the middle, and one was two inches outside, and you’re like, ‘Alright, I’m having a bad day, and everybody knows it,’” Caron said later on in the broadcast.
In the end, Trzeciak, a Triple-A umpire getting a chance to call a big league game, had five calls that were overturned by the challenge system before the end of the third.
But the calls weren’t the only bizarre thing to take place during Tuesday’s game.
Red Sox outfielder Wilyer Abreu was left a bit stunned when he broke his bat on a check swing in the bottom of the fourth inning.
Abreu did not make contact with the ball, yet a large section of his bat went flying off, leaving him holding a small piece of it.
The Pirates defeated the Red Sox in the exhibition game 16-7.
