Blue Notes · Umpire Grade2026-07-01
CIN @ MIL
Home plate: Brock Ballou
“Reliable as a Tuesday: no complaints, no headlines.”
Umpire Grade
93.5% accurate
Run Favor
runs, MIL
ABS Overturns
of 5 reviewed
What this shows — how Brock Ballou called the 154 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+0.39▼2 · 2-2 strike called ball· challenged
Jake Bauers vs Andrew Abbott - 2+0.39▼3 · 2-2 strike called ball
Joey Ortiz vs Andrew Abbott - 3-0.30▼7 · 3-1 ball called strike
Andrew Vaughn vs Brock Burke
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
5 pitches went to the robots · 2 overturned (ump overruled) · 3 upheld (ump confirmed). This is Hawkeye ground truth, no model involved.
- 1Gary Sánchez — ump said ball, robot ruled strike: overturned.
- 2Tyler Stephenson — ump said ball, robot ruled ball: upheld.
- 3Sal Stewart — ump said ball, robot ruled strike: overturned.
- 4Sal Stewart — ump said strike, robot ruled strike: upheld.
- 5Gary Sánchez — ump said ball, robot ruled ball: upheld.
Our tracked-rulebook zone matched the ABS ruling on 3 of 5 — a zone-definition gap (ABS grades a standardized, height-based zone), not our error.