Robot umpires flip 54% of challenged calls as Reds lead way - ESPN

NEW YORK — Robot umpires overturned 54% of challenged calls in the first season of the automated ball-strike system as catchers were far more successful than batters.

Learning when to challenge is key.

The Cincinnati Reds had a net gain of 16.8 runs, according to Baseball Savant calculations of total run value of overturns on challenges. The Los Angeles Angels were next at 14.0, followed by the Athletics (12.3) and Minnesota Twins (10.1).

The Cleveland Guardians were 30th at minus-13.4, and several other playoff teams — the Dodgers (26th, -8.5), Rays (25th, -7.8), Cubs (21st, -4.6), Brewers (20th, -2.4), Braves (18th, -2.1), Padres (17th, -1.9), Yankees (16th, -2.1) and Astros (15th, -0.8) — also rated poorly by that metric.

Houston's Jose Altuve topped batters with 5.6 projected runs gained, followed by Seattle's Cal Raleigh (4.6), Colorado's Kyle Karros (4.5) and Cincinnati's Sal Stewart (4.4) and JJ Bleday (4.1).

The Cubs' Seiya Suzuki led with 5.7 runs projected lost in defensive challenges, just ahead of the Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani (5.5), Cubs' Ian Happ (5.2) and Michael Busch (5.1), and Mets' Brett Baty (3.5).

Milwaukee's William Contreras led catchers with 5.2 projected runs prevented, just in front of Cleveland's Patrick Bailey (5.1), the Mets' Francisco Alvarez (4.5) and San Diego's Freddy Fermin, Kansas City's Carter Jensen and Drew Romo of the Chicago White Sox (all 4.3).

«It's like a new muscle for players to learn,» Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. «You have instincts over what to do in certain situations. This is a new instinct of knowing when to challenge and instinctively within a second, oh, that's a ball. What's the situation?»

There were 10,557 challenges, an average of 4.35 per game, and 5,686 led to