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Old May 11th, 2007, 02:05 PM   #82 (permalink)
hiaspire
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Too many modern-day fans believe the game is already too slow without adding not-so-instant replay to things, but the goal should still be to get the calls right when they matter most. It is a little unrealistic to believe umpires can make some of these close calls that are so far away from their vantage point, and increasingly technology makes those guys look bad because video does get a better look at it.

Can't we implement something that minimizes interuption? I'm not sure why replay has to take as long as it does in all sports. In football there is a whole ceremony almost full of pomp and circumstance, with challenge flags being thrown, on-field discussions about the issue involved, crowd announcements, and the zebras trotting off to the sidelines to poke their head under the monitor for a long look before eventually announcing the results of the investigation.

To me, most people in the audience watching it on TV know what really happened on the field long before any decisions are made. In big games, they run online polls where fans vote for the correct call by the thousands before anything is announced. Then you spend several minutes waiting to see if they saw the same thing on the field monitor and can get things going again.

I don't know why you don't just have a supervisory official attending all the games whose job it is to evaluate the on-field umpires and provide whatever support is needed (communicating to league office, checking weather reports, watching for possible calls that should be reversed based upon video evidence, logging issues for evaluation purposes, etc.).

The head man on the field can have a communication devise in his pocket to speak with the boss upstairs when a questionable call happens. Just like they stand around and discuss the issue amongst themselves when those questionable calls happen, but now they can have communication to the outside world in a trusted league official who has more information to share with them and can tell them exactly what it looked like on video for them to also consider as they discuss things on the field.

Then you wouldn't need an umpire going off to some station to view the video and slowing things down as fans boo. By the time they decided that they need some help, the supervisor upstairs has probably already seen the replay several times and can tell them exactly what the call should be, and they can get on with the game without replay having a NOTICABLE impact.

That minimizes the presence in the game to the traditionalist fans, keeps things moving along, and gives the umps more relevant information to make sure they get things right more often in such situations.
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