SD @ SF
Home plate: Junior Valentine
“Solid and unspectacular — exactly what the job asks.”
What this shows — how Junior Valentine called the 154 pitches that were taken (no swing), graded against the tracked rulebook strike zone. He got 143 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
The calls that moved the game
- 1+0.30▼2 · 3-1 strike called ball· challenged ✓
Scott Bandura vs Nick Pivetta - 2-0.13▲6 · 1-1 ball called strike
Samad Taylor vs Matt Wilkinson - 3+0.13▲1 · 1-0 strike called ball
Manny Machado vs Logan Webb
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 · 1 overturned (ump overruled) · 2 upheld (ump confirmed). This is the ABS system’s own measurement — Hawk-Eye optical ball-tracking, not our model.
- 1Bryce Eldridge — ump said strike, robot ruled strike: upheld.
- 2Ethan Salas — ump said ball, robot ruled strike: overturned.
- 3Ethan Salas — ump said ball, robot ruled ball: upheld.
Our tracked-rulebook zone matched the ABS ruling on 3 of 3 — a zone-definition gap (ABS grades a standardized, height-based zone), not our error.