Blue Notes · Umpire Grade2026-05-04
LAD @ HOU
Home plate: Mark Ripperger
“Called a fair game and let the players decide it.”
Umpire Grade
98.2% accurate
Run Favor
runs, HOU
ABS Overturns
of 3 reviewed
What this shows — how Mark Ripperger called the 163 pitches that were taken (no swing), graded against the tracked rulebook strike zone. He got 160 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+0.23▼2 · 0-2 strike called ball
Cam Smith vs Yoshinobu Yamamoto - 2-0.10▲5 · 0-1 ball called strike
Will Smith vs Ryan Weiss - 3-0.09▲2 · 0-0 ball called strike
Will Smith vs Ryan Weiss
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
3 pitches went to the robots · 2 overturned (ump overruled) · 1 upheld (ump confirmed). This is Hawkeye ground truth, no model involved.
- 1Christian Vázquez — ump said ball, robot ruled ball: upheld.
- 2Isaac Paredes — ump said ball, robot ruled strike: overturned.
- 3Christian Vázquez — ump said strike, robot ruled ball: overturned.
Our tracked-rulebook zone matched the ABS ruling on 1 of 3 — a zone-definition gap (ABS grades a standardized, height-based zone), not our error.