Umpire Grade · Blue Notes

Ryan Additon

25 games graded behind the plate.

Season Grade

92.6% ± 0.8

Avg Swing

runs / game

ABS Overturns

54/117 calls

3,741 correct of 4,039 graded takes (92.6% ± 0.8, 95%). Best game 96.7% · worst 87.5%. Grade is accuracy on taken pitches vs the rulebook zone; ABS is the Automated Ball-Strike System challenge record (how often the robots overruled the call).

What we can't say about Ryan Additon

This season is 4,039 graded takes, which puts Ryan Additon's overall accuracy at 92.6% ± 0.8 (95% interval). That is a real measurement against a league spanning about four points end to end. It is not enough for anything finer, and here is the arithmetic rather than our word for it:

how the zone moves with two strikes — about 808 takes, so ±1.8 points. (the league-wide two-strike effect is about 1 point in 2026.)
any single corner of the zone — about 337 takes, so ±2.8 points. (corner cells are where umpires actually differ.)
whether one pitcher is called tighter than another — about 67 takes, so ±6.3 points. (a given pitcher is worked once or twice a season.)

And a note on the number itself: an accuracy figure is a rate plus a convention for what counts as a miss. Ours grades every taken pitch against the rulebook zone as the feed reports it. Others are more forgiving — UmpScorecards counts a call wrong only when the pitch was at least 90% likely to be a strike — so two sites can print the same percentage about the same umpire and not mean the same thing by it. How the grade is built.

The overturn rate is a different kind of number and does not belong beside the grade: it is accuracy on the 117 pitches players chose to challenge, which are the pitches they already believed were wrong. 117 is enough to print it with its own denominator, which is what we do — but it still ranks umpires by how often they are appealed, not by how often they are right.

The road to the plate

The 42nd Round

Drafted as a pitcher out of high school, he spent 381 games as a call-up umpire before earning a full-time major-league position.

From the 42nd Round

Ryan Additon was born in Miami, Florida, and attended Western High School in Davie. The San Francisco Giants drafted him in the 42nd round of the 2004 MLB draft. He didn't sign. He went to Lynn University, and in 2008 he pitched a season for the Kalamazoo Kings in the Frontier League. One summer as a professional player, and then a different door into the game.

He was hired as a professional umpire in 2010, starting in the Gulf Coast League, and reached Triple-A by the 2016 season. His MLB debut came on May 21, 2017 — first base, Target Field. From there the road ran through call-up work: 381 games as a fill-in umpire before he was promoted to the full-time MLB staff on February 4, 2022. Twelve years from the Gulf Coast League to a permanent major-league position, for a man born in 1985 who wears number 67 and stands 6-foot-4.

One of those call-up assignments put him behind the plate on May 19, 2021, when Corey Kluber threw a no-hitter for the New York Yankees against the Texas Rangers at Globe Life Field. Additon was still a call-up then. That game was one of the 381.

Into October

Additon works on a crew led by crew chief Lance Barksdale. His first postseason assignment was the 2023 National League Division Series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Arizona Diamondbacks. He has since worked Wild Card Games in 2024 and 2025 and a League Championship Series in 2025, his October assignments expanding each year since that first NLDS.

We have graded him behind the plate in 20 games this season.

Reporting: Wikipedia, MLB.com. Umpire data: MLB StatsAPI, via the Fever engine.

By the Desk · filed 2026-07-23 — the profile reads as of its filing; the grading record above is live · every fact in this piece comes from a sourced research pack and clears an independent fact-check, and nothing is edited after filing.

The games

Game	Grade	Favor	ABS	Blue Note
NYY @ BAL2026-08-20	A	0.2 NYY	2/3	The kind of night where the umpire is the least of the story.
BOS @ PIT2026-08-15	B+	0.6 BOS	2/4	The kind of night where the umpire is the least of the story.
CHC @ WSH2026-08-11	B+	0.9 CHC	2/4	The kind of night where the umpire is the least of the story.
ATH @ CIN2026-08-06	B+	0.9 CIN	1/2	Down the middle. Both dugouts had the same zone.
SD @ MIA2026-07-25	B+	0.8 MIA	0/4	The zone stretched its legs.
CWS @ TEX2026-07-20	A	0.4 CWS	0/3	Nothing that'll trend, and on this beat that's a compliment.
KC @ BAL2026-07-12	B-	0.5 KC	0/3	The plate grew a few inches after the first pitch.
CLE @ MIN2026-07-08	C+	0.8 CLE	5/9	The players kept asking for a second opinion — and kept getting one.
HOU @ DET2026-06-28	B+	1.1 HOU	3/6	One side pitched to a slightly bigger plate.
LAD @ MIN2026-06-24	B-	0.3 LAD	4/7	A small strike zone, generously enforced for the offense.
WSH @ TB2026-06-20	B	0.2 TB	5/6	Hawkeye clocked in early and stayed late.
CLE @ MIL2026-06-16	B	0.3 MIL	0/2	Solid and unspectacular — exactly what the job asks.
MIN @ DET2026-06-11	A	0.8 MIN	1/3	Down the middle. Both dugouts had the same zone.
MIA @ NYM2026-05-30	B	0.9 MIA	3/6	The zone kept to itself — the hitters said thanks.
TB @ BAL2026-05-25	B-	0.0 BAL	3/8	Generous with the corners — the pitchers said thank you.
CIN @ PHI2026-05-20	B-	0.5 CIN	4/6	The black wasn't in play tonight.
KC @ STL2026-05-16	D	1.3 KC	2/2	Somebody's pitching staff sent a thank-you note.
SD @ MIL2026-05-12	D	1.1 SD	3/5	The grade leaned — the ledger says which way.
ATL @ SEA2026-05-06	C+	0.9 SEA	3/6	The black wasn't in play tonight.
WSH @ CWS2026-04-25	D	0.7 WSH	4/9	The zone shrank when the pitchers needed it most.
MIN @ NYM2026-04-21	A-	0.0 MIN	1/4	Nothing that'll trend, and on this beat that's a compliment.
DET @ BOS2026-04-17	A	0.1 DET	0/1	If umpiring had a highlight reel, this wouldn't make it. That's the compliment.
LAA @ NYY2026-04-13	C+	1.3 NYY	4/7	One dugout got the friendlier version of the evening.
SF @ SD2026-04-01	A	1.0 SF	0/1	The zone kept its promises.
CLE @ SEA2026-03-28	A	0.0 CLE	2/6	You could set a watch by that zone.