Pirates’ spring clash vs Red Sox exposes troubling ABS flaw

For the better part of two seasons, Major League Baseball finally felt like it had solved one of its most persistent problems.

In addition to shaving minutes off the average contest, the pitch clock restored rhythm and gave baseball back its pulse. And now, in the name of technological “perfection,” MLB risks slowing that heartbeat all over again.

The Automated Ball-Strike (ABS) challenge system has been widely welcomed during spring training. Fans love the idea of accountability. They love seeing a pitch called correctly. They love watching a borderline call get overturned on a big screen.

But there’s an uncomfortable truth lurking beneath the surface: every challenge is a pause. Every review is a break in flow. Every overturned pitch is another moment where the game stops being baseball and starts being a courtroom.

When MLB implemented the pitch clock in 2023, the results were dramatic. Game times dropped by more than 20 minutes on average. Dead air disappeared. Hitters stayed in the box. Pitchers worked with tempo. The sport felt athletic again.

There was initial resistance, sure. But players adapted quickly. By the end of the first month, it was clear that this wasn’t ruining the game — it was saving it.

The key wasn’t just shorter games. It was uninterrupted games. Baseball thrives on rhythm. A quick inning builds tension. A rapid sequence of pitches keeps fielders engaged. Momentum carries from pitch to pitch. The ABS challenge system chips away at that rhythm.

Just ask the Pittsburgh Pirates, whose exhibition game Tuesday in Fort Myers lasted three hours and 29 minutes.

Pirates-Red Sox spring game and example of how ABS provides precision at the expense of flow

During Tuesday’s Grapefruit League matchup between the Pirates and the Boston Red Sox at JetBlue Park, we saw exactly how disruptive this can become. Five consecutive calls from home plate umpire Mitch Trzeciak were overturned via ABS challenges before the end of the third inning. Five.

Instead of a pitcher getting the ball and attacking the zone, we watched catchers tap their helmets, managers signal for review, graphics pop up, and everyone wait for the verdict. The crowd buzzed not because of competition, but because of correction.

When a call was finally upheld in the fourth inning, the stadium cheered — not for a strikeout or a hit, but for an umpire finally getting one right. That's just procedural theater.

The argument for ABS is simple: get the call right. And yes, accuracy matters. Nobody wants a season decided by a missed pitch three inches off the plate.

But baseball has never been a game of geometric perfection. The strike zone has always had personality. Framing mattered. Catchers earned value by stealing edges. Umpires had tendencies that players learned and adjusted to.

The pitch clock modernized baseball without stripping away its human element. ABS — at least, in its current form — risks doing the opposite.

Instead of improving the game’s feel, it introduces micro-delays that add up. Even if each review only takes 20–30 seconds, multiply that by multiple challenges per game across a 162-game season. The cumulative drag is real.

And unlike replay on close plays — which at least resolve high-leverage moments — ABS reviews often interrupt routine counts in the second inning of a March exhibition game.

Where the pitch clock demands urgency from pitchers, ABS invites interruption. A borderline pitch becomes an opportunity to stall. A hitter behind in the count can reset. A pitcher rattled by a missed call now waits through a review process while the entire stadium watches an animation of the strike zone. We’re trading flow for forensic analysis.

Technology in baseball has worked best when it enhances the game without overwhelming it. The pitch clock did that. So did larger bases. Even limited replay review has largely found its lane.

But the strike zone is different. It exists on every single pitch. When you digitize something that fundamental, you don’t just fix mistakes. You reshape the entire experience. And if MLB isn’t careful, it may solve one problem while quietly resurrecting another: games that feel slower, heavier, more procedural.

Baseball fought hard to reclaim pace. It shouldn’t casually hand it back. Accuracy matters, but rhythm matters more — and right now, the balance feels fragile.