Blue Notes · Umpire Grade2026-04-30
AZ @ MIL
Home plate: Mike Estabrook
“The zone shrank when the pitchers needed it most.”
Umpire Grade
90.6% accurate
Run Favor
runs, AZ
ABS Overturns
of 4 reviewed
What this shows — how Mike Estabrook called the 159 pitches that were taken (no swing), graded against the tracked rulebook strike zone. He got 144 right. Below, only his misses are plotted, alongside every pitch the ABS (Automated Ball-Strike System) reviewed on a challenge.
The zone, as he called it
strike called ballball called strikeABS overturnedABS upheld
The calls that moved the game
- 1-0.21▼8 · 3-0 ball called strike
Tyler Black vs James McCann - 2+0.20▼6 · 2-1 strike called ball
Brice Turang vs Philip Abner - 3+0.13▲4 · 1-1 strike called ball
Alek Thomas vs Shane Drohan
Run impact from the count run-value table: a missed strike three is worth far more than one on 3-0.
ABS — the Automated Ball-Strike System
4 pitches went to the robots · 1 overturned (ump overruled) · 3 upheld (ump confirmed). This is Hawkeye ground truth, no model involved.
- 1David Hamilton — ump said strike, robot ruled strike: upheld.
- 2James McCann — ump said strike, robot ruled ball: overturned.
- 3James McCann — ump said ball, robot ruled ball: upheld.
- 4William Contreras — ump said ball, robot ruled ball: upheld.
Our tracked-rulebook zone matched the ABS ruling on 3 of 4 — a zone-definition gap (ABS grades a standardized, height-based zone), not our error.