Seven years is a relatively short time in Major League Baseball’s 150-year history. But since the turn of the decade, the amount of changes the game has taken on has been astonishing. Just to name a few: the three-batter minimum for pitchers, the National League adopting the designated hitter, the extra-inning ‘ghost runner’ at second base, the ban of defensive shifts, and the pitch clock. The last of those five certainly sparked plenty of debate when it was implemented in 2023, but there’s zero debate that it has worked as intended, shortening games by about 25 minutes.
This season has brought yet another new change, this time focusing on improving the accuracy of a home plate umpire’s most important job.
Of course I’m talking about the Automated Ball-Strike (ABS) challenge system, where teams get two challenges per game to try and overturn a called ball or strike. If a team wins a challenge, they can keep challenging until they lose both. Only the pitcher, catcher and batter can challenge a call.
Before ABS was introduced, I believed that it would strike a nice balance between letting players have the opportunity to overturn missed calls at crucial spots in their at-bats and hold umpires accountable to some extent without completely taking such an vital aspect of the game out of the umpires’ hands. Just over a week into the season, and my mind has not changed one bit.
One of the most frustrating things as a baseball fan is to see a key at-bat end with a called third strike that was clearly out of the zone or a called ball four that landed well above the knees. While it can be understandably embarrassing for umpires to see their glaring error on the big screen, it is ultimately beneficial for them in adjusting where exactly the zone is in their mind. It can be equally as rewarding for them to see them get a call correct by hundredths of an inch or smaller. Also, the whole challenge process takes approximately 15 seconds, so those fearing it would slow down the game to pre-2023 numbers should fret not.
This begs the question: If ABS is working so well, why not just completely replace the umpire with a totally automated ball-strike system? After all, tennis has adopted the electric line system at three of the four Grand Slams, so why can’t baseball do the same?
There are two reasons why that’s not the case (at least for now). The first is that it simply isn’t a popular idea among both players and umpires to go full robot. MLB has conducted multiple polls with fans, players and coaches, and going full ABS got far less love than the challenge system. Last spring, The Athletic ran an anonymous MLB players poll and 63.4% said they opposed robo-umps calling balls and strikes. While MLB always has the final say, there’s clear backlash from the majority of the baseball world on total robotic control.
The second and more objective reason is that it is still an imperfect system. ABS uses a two-dimensional model, basing its rulings off the exact middle part of the plate. But the actual strike zone according to MLB rules is three-dimensional. For example, that means that a pitch that nicks the corner of a plate but curves inside when it gets to the middle would be called a ball by ABS even though it would technically be a strike. The minor leagues actually tested out a 3D zone at first, but that led to inconsistent calls and a clear advantage for the pitcher.
For now, the ABS challenge system is a nice medium that benefits both the players and umpires. Well, except if you’re C. B. Bucknor. He had quite the rough week, from having multiple calls overturned by ABS last Sunday to calling Jake Bauers out during Tuesday’s Brewers-Rays game for not stepping on the first-base bag even though he clearly did and leaving Wednesday’s game for taking a foul ball to the face mask. Luckily for Bucknor, it’s only up from there.
Cornell men’s lacrosse back in win column
It has been quite the roller coaster of a season for the defending national champions. The Big Red won three straight games to start the year, only to lose back-to-back contests to Richmond and Penn State. It then started off its Ivy League slate with victories over Princeton and Brown, but then saw its 11-game regular season winning streak in Ancient Eight play snapped with a 13-12 loss at home to Yale last Saturday. Things weren’t gonna be easier with a road trip to Philadelphia to battle nationally-ranked Penn. But as it turned out, it was a mostly comfortable performance for Cornell.
I say ‘mostly’ because it was a tight, back-and-forth game to start things off. Tied at 4-4 early in the second quarter, the Big Red went on a 9-1 run to take a commanding 13-5 lead heading into the final stanza and maintained their eight-goal advantage to come out on top 16-8.
It was no surprise to see Willem Firth and Ryan Goldstein excel once again with five and four points, respectively. The big question entering this season was who would step up in attack to complete their trifecta of goalscorers. But it’s been more of a quartet of scoring this year with Ryan Waldman and Brian Luzzi answering the call. Both players were instrumental in the victory over the Quakers. Luzzi scored the first two goals of the aforementioned 9-1 run and finished with five points, while Waldman also scored twice during that stretch and ended with a hat trick.
Speaking of depth, what’s also been a nice surprise is that they have more than one capable faceoff specialist. Jack Cascadden was one of their key returners as one of the top players in the nation at the X, as she showcased against Penn by winning 15 of 22 faceoffs. But just the week prior, it was Michael Melkonian who got the bulk of the draws. The sophomore has been equally as brilliant, posting a .590 faceoff percentage to Cascadden’s .589 in a similar amount of draws. That’s a good ‘problem’ to have if you’re head coach Connor Buczek.
With just two more league games to go, the Big Red sits just half a game behind Harvard for top spot in the conference and home-field advantage for the Ivy League tournament. Saturday’s victory over Penn was a big one in keeping pace with the Crimson, who they will host on April 25 to end the regular season. But for now, the focus is on Duke this Saturday for a non-conference battle on Long Island. The Blue Devils started the season on fire at 8-0 but have since dropped their first two ACC contests to Syracuse and Virginia. Another ranked win could be on the cards for the Big Red, but it’ll be well-aware that Duke is desperate for a pick-me-up.
Michigan vs. UConn: Who wins March Madness?
From 68 teams down to two, this year’s edition of the NCAA men’s tournament has not disappointed, as I’ve chronicled multiple times. While many expected Michigan to be playing in tonight’s national championship, far fewer people believed UConn could make it back to the final. That includes yours truly, and it is here that I must disclose I am from Connecticut and naturally an avid Huskies fan.
The run UConn has pulled off shouldn’t come as a surprise given that they won back-to-back titles in 2023 and 2024 with Dan Hurley at the helm. But even as a two-seed, it appears that championship pedigree is a real thing. We saw it against Duke in the Elite Eight, battling back from 19 points down and having Braylon Mullins hit a 40-foot three-pointer to etch himself into March Madness folklore. We saw it once more against Illinois in the Final Four, taking down a Fighting Illini team who had decimated their previous opponents. But here they are with a chance to win a third title in four years, something that hasn’t been done since the great UCLA dynasty under John Wooden in the 1960s and 1970s.
The only problem? They’re facing a Michigan team who is on one of the most dominant runs we’ve seen in March Madness history. The Wolverines have won every single game by at least 13 points, but by far their most impressive was in the Final Four against Arizona. In what was supposed to be an instant classic, it was far from one as Michigan steamrolled their way to a 91-73 victory where they led by as many as 30 points.
Head coach Dusty May has created quite the buzzsaw in just his second season at the helm. Remember that May led Florida Atlantic to the Final Four in 2023, only to lose on a buzzer beater to San Diego State. Incidentally, they would have faced Hurley’s Huskies in that championship game, so it’s a full-circle moment for one of the rising stars in the coaching realm. May has fully embraced the current era of college basketball with a transfer-heavy squad. In fact, his starting five is all transfers, including star guard Elliot Cadeau, All-American Yaxel Lendeborg, and the seven-foot, three-inch Spanish behemoth Aday Mara.
UConn has also dipped into the transfer portal, namely with big man Tarris Reed Jr.. The senior is having himself quite the tourney, averaging 20.8 points and 13 rebounds per game as he gets set to face his former team. One advantage the Huskies do have is experience, mainly through Hurley and senior Alex Karaban, both of whom have won 18 NCAA Tournament games.
While my heart says to go with UConn, my brain (and my ESPN Ithaca Bracket Challenge bracket) ultimately feels Michigan will win its first title since 1989. Either way, here’s hoping for a competitive and entertaining championship game, unlike the women’s final on Sunday with UCLA demolishing South Carolina 79-51. Woof.
By the way, you can listen to Westwood One’s coverage of the national championship on 107.1 FM/1160 AM beginning at 6 p.m..
Other things that caught my eye:
- A tip of the cap to two Cornell men’s hockey players who will forgo their final season with the Big Red next year to head to the pros. Junior defenseman Hoyt Stanley signed a three-year entry level contract with the Ottawa Senators and will join their American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate Belleville Senators for the remainder of the 2025-26 season. Stanley paced the Big Red with 44 blocks, put up a career-high 15 points, and was a finalist for the ECAC’s Best Defensive Defenseman award. Junior forward Jonathan Castagna also inked a three-year entry level deal with the Calgary Flames and will be their AHL affiliate, the Calgary Wranglers. Castagna had a stellar final year with the Big Red, leading the team with 15 goals and 34 points—both career-highs—and led the nation with a 62.5 faceoff percentage.
- There’s starting off the season on a hot streak, and then there’s whatever Ethan Fantel is cooking up at the plate for Ithaca College baseball. The sophomore is off to a supernatural start to the season, batting .478 through the Bombers’ first 21 games. Even more crazy? He began the campaign on a 17-game hitting streak and has recorded a hit in all but two games. Along with his six home runs and 44 runs batted in, he’s putting up numbers that would make Joe DiMaggio proud.
- As the college lacrosse season is already past the halfway point, the high school lacrosse season is just getting underway. So far, so great for the Ithaca High School boys and girls lacrosse teams. The girls team came into the year off the back of a 17-2 campaign where it won a third straight title and made its first-ever state semifinal appearance. The Little Red picked up right where it left off with four straight wins. It has found multiple ways to win, blowing out Windsor 15-1 and Elmira 15-2 while grinding out 7-5 victories over both Corning and Horseheads. The boys team went 15-3 last time out but fell to Corning in the Section IV Class C championship. Like last year, it’s another strong start with three consecutive wins over Elmira (11-2), Horseheads (8-2) and Vestal (17-5).
