Breakdown: The Future of Umpiring: Robots or Humans?

Brian (00:14.786)
Hey, how we doing listener? Good to have you back. Welcome to another episode of Talent Chasing, a podcast that dares to ask the question, what do sports and office and the office world have in common? The answer is, as it turns out, quite a bit more than you think. Join us as we aim to bring real stories from the real world of sports and athletics to the confines of offices of corporate talent. My name is Brian Johnson and outside of being the lesser known of these other two fabulous gentlemen,

I'm a former Major League Baseball player and scout.

Chad (00:47.908)
Man, it took you a while to get there. I'm Chad Sowash, recruitment industry veteran and tech startup advisor and investor.

Brian (00:54.446)
Cold bomb guy.

Jasper (00:54.606)
yeah, it's a bit shorter intro there. I'm Jasper Spanjaart. I am a journalist and filmmaker. And in this episode, it's part of a breakdown series. So we literally break down news and topics of our favorite athletes and business icons. So this week we are breaking down the favorite subject of one Mr. Brian Johnson, the umpire in baseball, specifically in baseball. I love them or hate them. They're part of the game. they are part of the game, I think, but

I think we took that's the, and that's the big question because we come at you at a time where robo umpires are happening. We have a new challenge system in place, at least for spring training in the MLB where, I think this is w we've been talking about automation in the workforce. Now baseball being is being automated. Brian, first question we have for you. what do you think of umpires?

Chad (01:24.752)
But will they be? But will they be? Huh?

Brian (01:51.406)
So big, big issue here. I know it's always important to lead with the ball guy, so the ball guy always leads off, so. All right.

Jasper (01:53.774)
Chad (01:59.28)
Two out of three, two out of three ain't bad.

Jasper (01:59.47)
One of the bold guys, Yeah, 66 % chance. Yeah, go for it.

Brian (02:03.992)
So umpiring in baseball is really kind of unique. Kind of give a little bit background. Back when I played, back in the Stone Age, umpires kind of ran the show. They were the pillars of authority. Everyone respected the umpires. And there's arguments here and there, OK, because they would allow you to challenge things. But overall, there was respect for the authority of umpiring as an industry.

Jasper (02:13.421)
haha

Jasper (02:28.652)
Okay.

Brian (02:31.67)
And so baseball, that's kind of how baseball worked, right? People respected the umpires. What's happened along the way with the, with the analytics revolution, call it whatever you want. There has been a breakdown of now that relationship has been broken. So the relationship now is trying to trick the umpire. So if you see the catcher is moving the glove all the time.

Chad (02:45.04)
Mm-hmm.

Brian (02:57.742)
trying to steal this, trying to steal that. Yeah, there was a little nuancing of the receiving end of catching before, trying to catch that corner. It was within reason. And I'm sure I've already told the story before, but Paul Runge was an old, crusty, great umpire from back in the day when I was in my rookie days. And he was very much an authoritarian. He was the police officer on the field. And so I tried to nudge.

Jasper (03:08.227)
Yeah.

Chad (03:22.32)
Mm-hmm.

Brian (03:25.538)
the ball that was on the black or the kind of ball strike that gray area. I tried to nudge it in a little bit too far. And so the umpire tapped me on my head and said, listen son, cause he always called me son. he said, I looked just like his son. He said, listen, this is my rookie year somewhere in the middle of my rookie year. He said, listen son, if you move your glove again, I'm going to call it a ball. So he's like, you just, you should just not do that. I was like, okay, no problem. said, but why are you going to call it a ball? He was like, well,

If you're trying to move it, you're telling me you think it's a ball. And I was like, that's kind of smart. So take that analogy or take that story and bring it into modern day baseball. There's no, there's, yeah, there's none of, there's no give and take there. It's all kind of trick the empire. And that was, you know, my last year in scouting and with the giants, had a new general manager and his whole philosophical approach to

Jasper (04:00.214)
Okay.

Jasper (04:04.543)
Yeah.

Jasper (04:08.248)
That's all they're doing, yeah.

Chad (04:19.12)
Mm.

Brian (04:23.072)
winning was trying to trick the umpire and get two or three strikes a game. Which is okay, it's not even debatable, right? That's not a philosophy for winning championships. And so anyway, so I say all to say that's all out the window. The umpires are therefore looked at as just kind of not a relevant piece, not really an important part of the game. And so it's no surprise that we're gleaning towards this robotic umpire piece.

Now having said that, if it was just going to the robot umpire, I wouldn't be for it because it's the robot is kind of funky and it's a different way to look at things. I don't know if we'd ever really get it perfect to where it wouldn't be so sterile and so, you know, so unhuman like, but what I've heard and what I've learned from guys in AAA and the minor leagues and AAA, the highest level of minor league baseball is that the challenge system has come into place.

Chad (04:53.85)
Mm-hmm.

Chad (05:08.944)
Mm-hmm.

Jasper (05:08.994)
Yeah.

Brian (05:19.96)
Kind of a mixture of both, right? The umpire is still behind home plate. The umpire will still make the call. But if the hitter or the catcher or the pitcher, any of those three want to challenge a pitch that was called a called pitch, they have, you know, just like in football, they have three challenges. And if you mess up, you lose them or basketball too. And so I like, I'm all for that process. It keeps the umpire in play, keeps them employed, keeps them part of the game. Cause you need humans to part of the game.

Jasper (05:48.788)
I agree, yeah.

Brian (05:49.602)
And but it does give some leeway and it allows hope I think for a much better game to be called. So that's my spiel on the robotic system. What do you guys think? Not that I really care, but I'm just waiting so I can talk again. But what do you guys think? Just to make it look good.

Jasper (06:00.3)
Quite the spiel. Quite the spiel. That was a long win.

Chad (06:01.87)
Yeah. So, so.

I love it because you were the guy that sat behind the plate. mean, and I would assume that you were the guy who really had the relationship with the empire because you were right there with them talking to them all the time. So, I mean, that to me, that perspective is awesome. For me though, watching tennis back in the day, remember when Cyclops came out? Remember back then?

Jasper (06:15.05)
Exactly, yeah.

Jasper (06:33.4)
Yeah.

Brian (06:34.461)
Mmm, yeah. good call. Yeah.

Chad (06:37.166)
So Cyclops came out and that was just a flawed system. Now they've got Eagle Eye. I don't know why they have any judges whatsoever because I mean it is zoned in. They've gotten rid of the net judge. Remember there used to be somebody that had their hand on the net the entire time. They're gone. They've been gone for a while. Why? Because you can put a sensor there and it's very simple, right? And plus you don't need somebody that you could prospectively hit with a, you know, 80 mile an hour forehand.

Brian (06:51.47)
that's right, that's right.

Jasper (06:51.542)
Yeah

Brian (06:55.342)
Hmm

Brian (07:03.982)
Mm-hmm.

Chad (07:04.9)
But I mean, for me, when we take a look at sports overall, and we're seeing kind of like the tennis approach and then the NFL approach where you can throw a flag and you can get a replay, right? To me, I do like having the ump there, but I liked it in the old days where if there was a little disrespect, I mean, that made the news. Today, it just doesn't, it just...

Jasper (07:15.928)
Meh.

Chad (07:33.294)
doesn't happen. So I mean, just going to a robo-ump for me, because you can see strikes, balls, all of it, right? And then, I mean, so, okay, let's just go ahead and push them out the door. The hard part for me, as we look at the corporate side of the house, is everybody talking about AI and automation taking their jobs. And in some cases, take a look at it. Now, in this case, the ump's job could prospectively be out the window. It's not going to be right out of the gate because the

Jasper (07:39.948)
Yeah, yeah, you can, yeah.

Chad (08:02.992)
the opportunity for replay. But you take a look at jobs on the corporate setting in most cases, not all cases, a job is nothing but a series of tasks. And for the most part, agents or AI or automation can't take all of those tasks, but they can take some of those tasks to make the job easier for the human. The question is, can that do that for an ump?

in some cases and find kind of like a sweet spot. So you do have a human there. you can do the, you know, the, the, the, the replays and all that other fun stuff, but, but can you do that? I think in tennis, to be quite frank, I just like to get rid of all those people. There too many judges on the dead meat. It's just ridiculous.

Jasper (08:34.702)
Yeah.

Brian (08:47.107)
Yeah.

Jasper (08:48.566)
Yeah. Well, yeah. I get what you mean, but it's, think with tennis, it's, it's a boring sport to begin with. I don't think we've ever talked about tennis. So sorry. I do not like, cannot watch tennis anymore. It's, it's no, could, there's tennis needs John McEnroe like shouting, obscuring obscene things. just, any personality that sport is lacking personality to a T it's absolutely lie. It's no, honestly, I used to, I used to watch

Chad (08:57.392)
speak for yourself.

Chad (09:08.589)
Any personality is good. Yes.

Brian (09:10.2)
Yeah.

Chad (09:17.325)
Djokovic has no, yeah, he's, he's, he's, yeah, sterile.

Jasper (09:19.456)
It's literally, these are very like the blandest personalities you could find. But I think baseball has had that problem with the, like for the last few years as well. think when you look at, you know, sports popularity in this, particularly in the U S baseball used to be, you know, America's favorite pastime. I don't think that's the case anymore. Ask the young, young people in the United States of America. They were like the NFL. They were like the NBA. They will start even watching NHL because there's fights going on. There's quite big personalities there.

Brian (09:28.706)
Mm-hmm.

Chad (09:40.026)
NFL.

Jasper (09:48.568)
So baseball has all baseball to the two of T right now has a bit of a personality issue. I don't know if, cause when you look at a game of baseball, where is the emotion in the sport? The emotion is lies with the umpire. So actually when you look at that from, from an entertainment point of view, know this is maybe a bad thing, bad way to look at it, but from an entertainment point of view, actually it feels quite good to get upset once in a while. And if we take that.

Brian (09:54.446)
Mm-hmm.

Chad (10:08.41)
Mm-hmm.

Brian (10:16.899)
Mm-hmm.

Jasper (10:18.478)
bit, that bit of emotion out of the game of baseball. I'm not sure there's enough left to captivate the young audiences. So I know that's not what our podcast is about, but it's, just wanted to sort of make that point because yeah. So I'm not sure it's going to be a great development for MLB. Yeah. might, players might be slightly happy because they're not going to get a third strike out. That was uncalled for literally like it was unfair, but at the same time, from an audience point of view.

Chad (10:30.709)
Business, mean, and talent is business, right?

Jasper (10:47.998)
I don't see the benefit all that much.

Chad (10:50.842)
But you're saying the game is boring is what you're saying. If you have to actually, if you actually have to manufacture drama, you're saying the game is boring. Did you hear that, Brian? Did hear him say that?

Jasper (10:53.408)
I love baseball.

I love baseball. love World Series. love, but no, no, no, don't get me wrong. I love the ninth, ninth inning, ninth inning comebacks. I know the New York, I was watching quite a few New York Mets games last year where they had a few, where they had the playoff run and they came back late in every game. And that is a lot of fun. Honestly, it is a lot of fun. There's dramatics in it. But for me, I've been a baseball fan for a long, long time. Yeah. New York Mets.

Brian (11:02.126)
You

Chad (11:22.746)
Did you say New York?

Okay, I was just kidding.

Jasper (11:28.29)
You had it lined up in there. Awful. Wasn't even talking about the jets, mate. Yeah, the jets. Yeah, no, but honestly, it's a question worth asking. And that's why I think MLB is so big, because that technology has been around for ages. We had the automated strike, so we've had every form of tracking for ages because baseball has been quite tech savvy when it comes to that. I think MLB has just not wanted to put this in because they realize it's going to take away from the entertainment of the game.

Brian (11:29.966)
Yeah, you knew the jets were gonna come at some point.

Chad (11:51.527)
yeah, yeah.

Jasper (11:58.316)
Because if Philadelphia fans are not shouting at the umpire, who are they shouting? Honestly.

Brian (11:58.627)
No.

Brian (12:02.158)
You know, yeah, exactly right. There's no shortage of people to yell at.

Chad (12:04.502)
Philadelphia fans are going to find people to shout out.

Jasper (12:06.604)
That's true. That's true for Philadelphia. Okay. So baseball is saved in Philadelphia, but go on, Frank. What is the point you want to make?

Brian (12:12.91)
Well, to be honest, I completely agree with every point that you make, Jaspery. And I understand that's rare, but it's true here. Yeah, a t-shirt. I get you a t-shirt. But no, I agree. MLB, Major League Baseball does have a personality problem. And I think part of it gets into kind of a separate issue. I don't think the umpires is the issue. I don't think people tune in because of the umpires.

Jasper (12:20.43)
Ooh, can we get a sort of certificate for that to say like, can I record it? That's my ringtone.

Chad (12:24.048)
Wait, wait a minute.

Brian (12:40.958)
and the conflict that comes from that. I do think, I look at the NBA, look at the NFL. Remember when the NFL, couldn't celebrate a touchdown, right? You got 80,000 people screaming and yelling with you, and you had to be like, sterile and act like it's no big deal and just hand the ball to the referee like Barry Sanders used to do. And baseball has had so many rules internally about, you know, they want to show the other team up and all that. And I get that. You know, I don't want people to be ridiculous about it, like,

Chad (12:48.708)
Yep. Yep.

Jasper (12:48.864)
yeah.

Brian (13:09.1)
with teams, you know, planning their flag in the college football level, planning the flag in the middle of the field and completely stomping on the logo at the middle of field or the other team. Okay, that's a bit much. But I think at baseball, we definitely need to see the personalities of the players that they have. them, you know, let them celebrate strikeouts because hitters like to celebrate home runs. Okay, dude. So you're going to get celebrated when you punch out three times and see how that goes, you know? And so

Jasper (13:29.023)
I agree completely.

Jasper (13:35.157)
Exactly, yeah.

Brian (13:37.71)
But it should be, that's okay, when somebody slams in the NBA, it's entertainment. No one takes a person, or over time they may take a person, they're gonna step up their game, right? And dunk even harder than the other guy. That's the kind of stuff that you want. of Luke Panella throwing bases on the baseball field, yelling at the umpire and kicking dirt on the plate. It was fun to watch, but-

Jasper (13:44.279)
It is.

Jasper (14:01.334)
Yeah.

Brian (14:05.034)
Is that really where people sign up to go watch? No, they go sign to see the players.

Jasper (14:08.193)
Do you remember a few years back when Fernando Tatis Jr. hit the, I think he hit a grand slam in the like the ninth inning of a blowout game and they were pitching to him to be fair. Like they were pitching to him. So, and the, the, the opposing manager got so upset that for Tatis took a swing because they were already up by 10 points. yeah, exactly. What are you supposed to do? Do you expect a professional to like,

Brian (14:27.596)
What are you supposed to do?

Jasper (14:32.746)
He gets like a meaty fastball fastball right down the middle. You expect him to be like, I'm going to take it because yeah, we're already up by 10 guys. mean, geez, don't want to embarrass these guys. No, you're going to hit it out of the park if you can, because that's your job. Like we need more of that in baseball. We need people celebrating successes. We need people fucking if it's a, if it's a ninth inning and it's a blowout game. Yeah. You go and hit a grand slam. Great for you and celebrate it.

Brian (14:38.861)
Right.

Jasper (15:00.6)
Please celebrate it. And like he had to apologize afterwards for celebrating too much and like, yeah, integrity of the game, buddy. You want to captivate a young audience? You don't start hammering on about the integrity of the game. You just want, it's just entertainment.

Brian (15:15.054)
Yeah, and that's the NBA and the NFL are doing well. They'll put in their second string guys or the third string guys, but they're playing hard until the last final seconds. And then they'll need for the final seconds or the basketball player will no longer drive with less than 24 seconds left in the game, right? That's showing respect for the game. But baseball, that's why we don't have a shot clock. So you go until the final out and you go if it's 30 to two.

Chad (15:26.856)
yeah. yeah.

Jasper (15:27.339)
Exactly.

Brian (15:44.27)
Then it's 30 to two. Get over it and go beat the team the next day. But yeah, getting back to the robot umps, I think it's time. Because everybody says, oh, throwing 100 miles per is so difficult to call a game. No, it's not. No, it's not. This is not a difficult skill to do. The umpires in general in baseball should be better at it than they are. And they're not improving as an industry over time. We've got the same issues.

Chad (16:07.112)
huh. Is it because they're old?

Jasper (16:10.847)
Is it because they're old?

Brian (16:12.888)
Same issues we had with Eric Gregg back in the day with Greg Maddux throwing stuff off the plate, a foot off the plate, he's bringing them up. We got the same type of thing here. Now there's better checks and balances. There used to be no checks and balances for umpires. There's plenty of checks and balances in every sport, baseball included, and that's a great thing because umpires get rewarded for good play, for excellence, right? And they get corrected and educated for things that are not.

Chad (16:17.983)
yeah.

Jasper (16:18.349)
Yeah, yeah.

Brian (16:41.41)
real good and quietly they'll get rid of umpires that are bad. So this is a good thing I think the robotic guns I think people will I think the players will appreciate I don't think the umpires umpires I don't think the fans are gonna care either way.

Chad (16:57.264)
No, well, I don't think they will. And I just did a quick lookup on, we're talking about fake wrestling. WWE makes 1.3 billion a year.

Brian (17:11.68)
amazes me that stuff is still around. But that's a whole different show. We can get into that.

Chad (17:13.98)
And yeah, but it's entertainment, right? 1.3 billion now. mean, major league baseball, it's been around a hell of a lot longer, around 12 billion. but it's dwarfed by the NFL, the amount of money that's actually being made. mean, the amount of money that the major league, that major league baseball makes is about as I should say the Dallas Cowboys make almost that much. The Dallas Cowboys, one team in the NFL. So

Jasper (17:16.982)
Entertainment. Yeah.

Jasper (17:37.984)
Yeah, that says a lot, doesn't it?

Brian (17:40.558)
Sure. Sure.

Jasper (17:42.286)
Yeah.

Chad (17:42.736)
And again, but I think a lot of it has to do with the, the, ability to not allow the refs. And when we've talked about the Kansas city chiefs, but not allow the refs to be able to control games per se. in this case, the OMS just calling, calling balls and strikes, right. And, then, so I, I don't know. I, we have to understand that that's obviously it's entertainment. So they need the opportunity.

Brian (17:53.698)
Yeah

Jasper (18:02.668)
Yeah, that's true.

Jasper (18:10.03)
And the, and the, and the challenge and the sort of challenge system has been in place for a bit with baseball. Like if you, like if a manager says, well, he actually stole second base and you know, the umpire said, no, have a challenge over override system where you can challenge the call. But I do want to ask Mr. Brian Johnson, one more thing though, because I'm always fascinated by the catcher position always have been. It's, it's probably the reason why you are on this show, but it's well, one of the reasons why you're on this show.

Chad (18:11.504)
to have entertainment.

Brian (18:35.886)
This is not my good looks.

Jasper (18:39.936)
It is mostly, mostly your God. Yeah. Well, but as a catcher, you like chat alluded to it earlier. you have a relationship with the umpire. You're, you're literally in front of the guy kneeling down, catching balls for an hour and a half, basically every night. When, when you come up to bat, you, does it feel like you have to be a bit more careful?

Chad (18:40.461)
Man, talk about a God complex, that jaster.

Brian (18:45.112)
shit

Jasper (19:03.724)
with any sort of form of criticism because, you know, as a hitter, you can get really frustrated with an umpire. You get thrown out quite easily of the game. Did you always sort of take a step back because you felt like you needed that good relationship because you don't see a lot of catches being thrown out even right in this day and age. So did it sort of put a lid on what you wanted to say or like made you think differently in games?

Brian (19:29.678)
yeah, big time. And that's a great shout out by you. Because that is a big deal. Because it's more important for me to maintain a good relationship for my pitcher, and therefore the rest of my team, than to argue about something that's an inch here, an inch there, it's on the black or whatever. So it's a fine line. What it also allows for is if I do disagree with something in my bat, I can talk about with him while my pitcher is warming up the next inning.

Chad (19:41.616)
Mm-hmm.

Brian (19:58.35)
Say, hey, you know, I thought that was a little bit outside. You know, I thought it, you know, maybe caught the corner, but not, you know, definitely not the low strike, but maybe on the outside. Which part of it did you feel like it hit more? Whatever, it's in the conversation where it's respectful. He's going to have a conversation because I didn't show him up when I was in the plate. I wasn't making a big, I wasn't emotionally immature at the plate, right? And I want what I want. I mean, watching the NBA guys, everybody complains about every call.

every time, all the time, that gets old. But with baseball, yeah, it allowed for a give and take. There was a lot more respect for the umpire and build a relationship over time, right? We see these umpires like every other series basically, or every three series you'll run into the same guys. So it behooves you to build a relationship and to be respectful and to argue for things that really need to be argued for versus just, you know, what you're upset about in the moment. So, but it's a great call, it's a great question.

Chad (20:26.384)
Mm-hmm.

Jasper (20:26.478)
True. Yeah.

Jasper (20:39.201)
Exactly, yeah.

Chad (20:56.334)
that sounds like a relationship that you have with a manager or a leader, right? That you, mean, because you can't, you can't try to fight everything tooth and nail, right? You have to be able to manage that because it's a relationship that you have to manage. And you might see this guy once every three weeks or what have you, when you're in the office or when they're in the office. But I mean, that, that to me, it's again, from a corporate setting, you've got to maintain the

Jasper (20:56.449)
Another MP.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking, yeah.

Chad (21:23.084)
that relationship and you can't do it if you're just going after them every time they get something maybe a little bit wrong.

Jasper (21:29.506)
No, pick your fights and don't do it publicly. I think that's the main thing that you just pretty much told the world, Brian. think don't stand on the desk. Don't be like Chad. Don't be like Chad. That is a big...

Brian (21:29.698)
Right.

Chad (21:35.214)
Don't stand on a desk. Yeah, don't do that.

Brian (21:37.016)
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And the crux of it is putting yourself in their shoes, right? If I was the umpire and I made a mistake, how would I want to be treated? Or if I was my leader and made a mistake, would I want to beat him over the head with it? Would I want somebody to beat me over the head with it? Or have a conversation with me on the side and say, you hey, you got a tough job back here. I appreciate what you do. Here's what I saw.

Jasper (21:45.07)
Yeah.

Jasper (21:49.026)
Yeah.

Brian (22:06.414)
can definitely respect your opinion that maybe that's not what you saw, whatever. Regardless of whatever the situation is, business or sports, it works.

Jasper (22:16.938)
One follow up though, did you ever get into one with an amp? Like did you get into a heated amp? Were you ever thrown out of a game, Brian?

Brian (22:26.006)
Yeah, yeah, I think there was one time I remember. I think another time happened when I was a AAA or something. But in the big leagues, in San Francisco playing against Oakland A's, Ricky Henderson was at the plate. May he rest in peace, a great teammate of mine and a friend. Ball right down the middle, like first step out of the game, like right down the middle, like right down the middle, like couldn't be high or low.

Jasper (22:49.058)
First I've done it again.

Brian (22:53.902)
And I knew the I knew the umpire behind me and I held it there for a second like I threw it back and then threw a ball ball second time. Boom. Couldn't throw a better ball right down the middle ball. I'm like my what are we doing here? You know what's going on? Like I don't care who's at the plate. My guys on the on the mound. He deserves that pitch two times in a row. First hit of the game. What are we doing? And then I hear this tap tap of my head.

And in the video later I see him go, you're outta here. And what's funny about that is that my mom was in the stands that day. She could hear, she could tell by my body language that I was upset. And so she saw it coming before it happened.

Chad (23:25.178)
Yeah.

Jasper (23:28.847)
no.

Chad (23:35.994)
So that being said, that being said, this launches into something even better because we talk about equity. No, no, we're not talking about mom. We love mom, but we're not going to get into her now. About equity, right? Because from the standpoint of being able to go to something that is not a human, something that is not going to have bias, you're not going to have the shrinking and growing of strike zones.

Jasper (23:36.174)
Brian (23:41.582)
You wanna talk about my mom?

Jasper (23:48.566)
Thank you.

Chad (24:03.448)
So Ricky Henderson, you had to throw it perfect and sometimes even when you did throw it perfect, it was going to be a ball. So is this not something that is better for the game?

Brian (24:14.412)
Yeah. And it makes no sense. Cal Rickman Jr. was the same way. He got a whole bunch of pitches the same way, which just doesn't make any sense, right? In the equity argument, right? It makes no sense that you give some people good stuff and other people not. It's like, it's crazy. In the NBA, rookie players in the NBA never get calls put on them. Never get calls. But every tiki-taka call that they do, it's called. Because they're rookies. It just makes no sense. That doesn't help my...

Chad (24:23.79)
Yeah, yeah.

Jasper (24:33.262)
That's true, yeah.

Chad (24:33.37)
Yeah. Yeah.

Brian (24:44.332)
my feeling about umpires in general.

Chad (24:46.192)
Another reason to go ahead and get rid of vampires.

Brian (24:49.954)
Yeah, yeah, it is a great one.

Jasper (24:51.978)
think the equity part is a great perspective. That's a great perspective because I agree, in the NBA it's ludicrous. LeBron James always gets the big call. Any superstar, they get the calls. it's like a rookie gets clobbered and he's concussed and he's walking groggily to the bench and the ref's like, anything? No, I didn't get it. No, he's fine. Do we get flagrant foul? No, it's fine. He's just a rookie. He's just concussed.

Brian (25:00.394)
Ugh. Fing-finginell files all day.

Chad (25:05.018)
Mm.

Brian (25:09.141)
Right.

Jasper (25:17.646)
It's just, it's, it is quite staggering. And I agree in baseball, does happen. You get superstar treatment and I know in football, European football, it happens all the time. Certain players that it happens all the time. Certain players get the, get the calls because they're the big player. don't know. It's not like they're already best player in the world. Why did they need the extra help? Like you've got in football that the most

Brian (25:27.959)
Ooh, does it really?

Brian (25:32.258)
Yeah, what is that? What is that?

Brian (25:38.337)
Right.

Jasper (25:41.822)
Awful thing is that if you play a big guy, I always support the bad team. So they go and play these big teams away from home and the big teams always.

Brian (25:49.836)
Is there an emotional thing, reason why you support all these bad teams? Who on earth supports all these bad teams?

Jasper (25:53.194)
Self-hatred, has to be self-hatred. has to be a sort of deeper sense of, yeah, it's, I don't know. I can save them. Yeah. I can help them. I can make a difference. Yeah. But no, but honestly, big team, Chad watches a lot of football. He'll attest to this. The big teams playing at home, they always get the calls. They always get the decision from the referee.

Brian (26:00.334)
I can save them with my subscription to their website.

Jasper (26:18.05)
because there's 80,000 people shouting and screaming and we're expecting that one individual who has a soul, who has emotions to not get like emotionally involved. Like gotta go home that night, gotta see the kids, gotta be okay in the grocery store the next day. It's always happens. Yeah, just the tomatoes fine, yeah.

Brian (26:28.044)
Gotta go home that night. Yeah, their kids go to school in the area. Yeah.

Right. Can't have people throwing fruit and vegetables at them in the store.

Chad (26:39.054)
Well, and you also have to think about if you can go to that kind of a system, I mean, in tennis and baseball, you can't lobby for, because you know, the managers are out there, the catchers out there, you've got the hitter that's there, they're lobbying the entire time for a bigger strike zone, right? For a smaller strike zone, depending on what team you're on.

Jasper (26:53.205)
Yeah, I like hearing. Yeah.

Jasper (27:00.034)
Now in

Jasper (27:05.954)
You're taking that out of the game. Yeah, essentially. that's, think that is in a nutshell. Well, after this discussion, I feel a bit better about it now. I think that is actually going to benefit the sport. Whereas with football in Europe, it's just the VAR, the video assistant referee. It's still open to interpretation. I was watching Everton versus Manchester United this past weekend. They spent three and a half minutes looking at the footage, whether a guy was offside or not, or everyone could clearly see.

Chad (27:27.408)
huh.

Jasper (27:35.406)
The guy wasn't offside, like took me 10 seconds to figure it out. They drew lines and lines and lines and trying to figure out, was he offside? Was his small toe, was he offside? Three and a half minutes of my life that I'm never getting back. Because some guy in a video booth decided, well, let's have another look. Let's have a look from another angle. And then later in the game, there's a penalty shout. Everton get a penalty. And the referee goes, it's a penalty. Video assistant referee is like, no, maybe it's not a penalty.

Referee goes and looks at the screen. After 10 seconds, he decides, okay, maybe it's not a penalty. I'm like, how was one decision, three and a half minutes worth of your life, spending on looking at footage where everyone can see it's not offside, and then the penalty, you awarded the penalty, but then VAR decides that it has to be a clear and obvious error of the referee to ask the referee to go and watch it on the screen. And then after 10 seconds, the referee's like, yeah, that's fine, okay, it's not a penalty.

I'm like, what's going on? It makes no sense.

Chad (28:34.842)
Yeah. Why the video assist, I mean, there should be like some type of, and as we're seeing, as we're seeing, on the, the corporate side of the house, that assist should be more of a just literally yes or no kind of, you know, we, we have automations in place to do X, Y, Z or agents to do X, Y, Z. That's what they do. Right. Boom. They take that. That's what they do. So they, instead of allowing the video, you know, assist,

Jasper (29:04.493)
another referee essentially to look at it,

Chad (29:04.652)
Not really exactly. will just allow the tech to say yes or no and then move out smartly and get it done.

Brian (29:13.6)
I agree. I agree.

Jasper (29:13.77)
Exactly. I would love for football to come up with something that surely there has to be footage of 1 million penalties being given. Just accumulate it, get into a smart AI system and just automate that shit. I hope so. I hope, honestly, I hope so because this and adding another referee to the discussion is only going to cause more chaos. we saw, we see at the Premier League is a chaos every weekend. It's the same discussion. Like people are getting our anti-var. Please.

Brian (29:21.24)
Yeah.

Chad (29:23.706)
yeah. you know they've already done it. Yeah. you know they've already done it.

Brian (29:27.394)
Yeah.

Jasper (29:42.978)
get rid of our get rid of our and I get it because it's taken away from three and a half minutes looking at whether a guy's offside or not it's there's no point in that

Brian (29:51.546)
But let me say this, the argument that the lack of personality for baseball will go down even further by bringing in robotic UMPs in or the VAR system, whatever you want to do. I disagree, because I think it's a separate issue, the personality of the game. Because when I look at NBA games or the NFL games, I want them to review everything, because I want to know what the truth is. But I enjoy watching, especially the NFL is so good with just the

Jasper (30:14.434)
Okay.

Brian (30:20.142)
the clearest picture from the the pylon cam right and it it I it takes longer right and you wait but at least it's fair and that's the ultimate answer football such a hard game to referee same with basketball it's so hard to do that those games as a referee baseball is not that difficult because the ball has to come to the same spot you're only looking at this big of an area right and so you only have to look at where the guy catches it but whatever but I'd like it as a fan

Chad (30:21.198)
pylon cams. yeah.

Jasper (30:34.476)
Yeah, exactly.

Brian (30:49.528)
to be able to know that this is gonna be an accurate call every time for the most part.

Jasper (30:54.37)
Yeah, it's, agree. Now the NFL has nailed it. think the, I think football European. They don't. And that's the only thing that does get me. Yeah, please do. Because yeah, I, you know, I agree completely, but I think the NFL has been light years ahead of that with implementing technology in a way that actually benefits the integrity of the game, the actual integrity of the game. Whereas football, European football has just added another layer of complexion because they're adding new opinions to an opinion.

Brian (30:59.658)
except they don't they don't review everything and that i don't understand review everything sorry were you gonna say that

Jasper (31:23.054)
And it's rather than relying on the technology to look at it and interpret it, because that's what the NFL does. Is the ball in bounds or not? the ball and football has done that with goal line technology, like is the ball over the line, then it's a goal. And that's fine for me because it's just, that's the integrity of the game. But it's just when you add another opinion and it's just, and it feels so inconsistent because one week one will, you a foul will be called a penalty. And the next week it's like the exact same handball or a foul and you go, Oh, it's not a penalty. And I'm like, please just.

Brian (31:33.646)
Yeah.

Chad (31:35.354)
Yeah. Yeah.

Chad (31:53.156)
consistency.

Jasper (31:53.226)
make it, make it consistent because people like you're afraid to celebrate goals now because well, he, his left toenail might be off site. So I'm not sure if I can celebrate because it might get called back and there's nothing where there's no worse feeling in the world than celebrating a goal and being happy. then, it's been disallowed. Like it's, it's the worst.

Chad (32:11.664)
Yeah. Well, I think with European football, it's the interpretation, which is the hardest part because it should be a hard, fast yes or no. And that's the biggest problem that I've seen.

Brian (32:24.822)
It seems like it would be easy to yes and no. If you're draw the line, then draw the line. And you know when contact is made with the ball and you know where the guys are.

Chad (32:28.526)
Well, offsides is hard because you've got somebody who goes off some and then come back and what's the timeframe to be able to come back to be able to receive the ball. And it's just like, it should not be that hard. make it. That's the problem. American football is fucking complex. is the most complex sport period. Right. And then you take a look at what we call soccer, European football, right?

Jasper (32:33.1)
Yes.

Jasper (32:37.123)
Yeah.

Chad (32:55.224)
It's a very simple sport that they try to make complex. And it's like, why are you doing this? Just purity of it. Just keep it simple.

Jasper (33:02.094)
That's true, yeah.

Jasper (33:05.772)
Yeah, for me, one of the things that the biggest things is like, if you can't see it after 15 seconds of studying, then you can't override anything. honestly, think that should be, cause offside can be, there is no, offside, okay, if he's one yard offside, that's fine, call it, that's fine. But if it's, if it's less, it's just literally the toenail, then there is no real advantage anyway. Then it's probably just shit defending and the defender should have been in a better spot.

A goal is a goal. don't, and I, and when a brother of the balls, goal line technology again, that's great because if it's over the line, it's over the line. That's a goal, but don't get into the speculative three and a half minutes observing footage. Like it's, it makes no sense to me.

Brian (33:49.368)
Do they make adjustments each year and review it?

Jasper (33:51.714)
They tried to. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because they realize it's far from perfect. And the problem is every league in Europe is sort of playing with their own versions of the rules. And it's like, what could be handball in Germany and be awarded as a penalty could be looked at completely differently in England and then different in Belgium and then different in Spain. And then in Portugal, they might say, well, that's not how it's just, it's confusing. And it's just, it adds more and more confusing to confusion to the game. Whereas it should be.

Chad (34:01.125)
Mm-hmm.

Jasper (34:21.228)
a really simple game. You play 11v11 and whoever scores most goals wins, but it's become a bit more complex than that. I think it does showcase how technology can actually make a life and the sport more complex and not in a good way.

Chad (34:30.531)
Yeah

Chad (34:41.2)
Yeah. I was just looking for how many goals were disallowed by VAR in the 2023 to 2024, uh, premier league season. Guess how many now 53, 53 that yes. 53 goals in a season, right. And again, take that, take that away. Allow the computers to do the stuff.

Jasper (34:50.414)
Okay, probably over 100. That's actually still a lot. That's still a lot. 53 moments of happiness. but that's a lot. Yeah. Probably be more this year actually. Yeah.

Brian (35:01.163)
Yeah.

Chad (35:13.274)
For equity sake, for equity sake. Yeah, we'll have to have to have to stay on the one. Anyway, gents, listener, thanks for sticking around as we muddle along on this one. This was, this was fun. This is fun talking about like umping and reffing and how, you know, all this stuff, especially from Brian standpoint, being behind the plate. So thanks Brian for reliving those days, especially the day that you got kicked out. That was fun.

Brian (35:14.638)
That's right.

Jasper (35:17.614)
That's a good stat though. That's a good statistic.

Jasper (35:42.188)
the horrors of being kicked out in front of your mother, Brian, in front of your own mother who drove down for hours to make the long drive to see her son play in the sunshine. And you couldn't hold your nerve just for one inning being thrown out. She didn't even see you at bat. It's just like, you didn't even have to shower after that game. You could just go into the dressing room, get changed, sit next to your mom. conjured with professional.

Chad (35:43.51)
Hahaha!

Brian (35:44.366)
Yeah.

Chad (35:46.601)
in front of mom! man. Poor thing.

Brian (35:50.382)
you

Chad (35:56.592)
That's a Ricky Henderson, your buddy.

Brian (36:08.75)
So true, so true. didn't mention she threw a drink at the umpire, I'll say that for next time. No, just kidding, she didn't do that. Sorry, mom, I was just throwing it up.

Jasper (36:17.71)
Aww... Beautiful.

Chad (36:19.96)
All right, that's enough of this, if mom did, that's what I'm giving mom. All right, till next week, listener. Thanks guys, have a good one.

Brian (36:21.262)
Yeah

Jasper (36:30.776)
See ya.

Brian (36:32.11)
See you.