Video zK4GO2iOdh8

Next pitch, probably strike two.

A sinker that came back in.

He looks up.

He's like, oh boy, what's up?

And then a ball.

And then the 2-1 breaking ball slips out of his hands.

He says, oh no, it hit him.

It hit him.

He's going to take his base.

That's a bad start to the thing.

Topper says, hold on, hold on.

Let's check the replay here.

There it is.

And oh, oh, okay.

Roll it.

We're good.

We're good.

We were wrong.

Here's the at-bat everyone's talking about.

The first pitch is going to be a get-me-over breaking ball.

Just right down the middle.

Easy call.

He wasn't looking for a breaking ball.

It was.

Then a dotted, low-and-away, 97-mile-per-hour fastball.

Now he's looking down.

Let's throw one up top.

Because he thinks, I've got to protect low in the zone, so let's bang one high.

There it is.

Strike three.

No.

Okay.

No.

Thought he had him.

He's looking to the sky like, don't I remember getting that pitch in this situation once before?

And look what I found.

Earlier in the season, this is the same pitcher, the same catcher, the same batter, and the same umpire.

Back in April.

That's wild, right?

And he threw this pitch, and he got the strike call.

So he was like, what's wrong with this one?

Is it a little higher?

Because it's more inside.

Now, they're different venues, different stadiums, so the camera angle isn't exactly the same.

I can't overlay them.

And they're going to look different because they're coming from different angles.

But, yeah, very similar.

You know, the one here is higher, but it is more over the plate.

So maybe Phil Cousy's saying, no, it's over the plate.

But that's too high for me.

That square that we see on the screen, that's just like, you know, a guideline for the viewer.

It's not real.

So maybe, okay, fine, we'll give it to him.

He says, fine, you're not going to give me the high strike.

I'm just going to go back to that low and away fastball.

I'll just dot one there.

I'll strike him out again.

And bam, there it is.

Wait, what?

Phil, come on.

Topper's like, that's the.

That's the same as the second pitch.

That's the same as the second pitch.

This is both pitches at once.

I bet you thought that was just one pitch, but actually it was an overlay.

They are that similar.

And at the very end, you can see them split off a tiny bit.

But come on, that's a very similar pitch.

One gets called a strike.

The other doesn't get called a strike.

They are strikes.

What are we doing?

Well, a lot of people are going to say that's catcher.

Framing for you on the left was the second pitch.

It gets called a strike.

And you can see Real Muto sets up with the glove low.

This is what everybody's doing now, majority of the time.

So the umpire doesn't have a distorted view and then doesn't know where the target is intended

and just pulls it up.

The other one on the right side, he sets up high and the pitch is low, which ends up.

He's got a stab for it, which makes the umpire think maybe he missed his spot.

But umpires are giving a lot of fake like setups now because they.

I think they're getting, they are getting relayed to the batter.

So a lot of times catchers are giving fake setups and it might not be a missed spot,

but that is why you'd say a lot of people would say, well, yeah, you've got to frame it better.

People love doing that.

And I was like, I don't know, guys, that is still a strike.

You know, I think that gets called a strike a lot.

So what I did, I put on my shady rays.

I took to baseball savant.

I found.

The X and Z axis of that.

That pitch, which was the X axis point six zero, the Z one point eight three.

And I found every pitch that crossed the plate at that same exact axis since we've been tracking

this, which is 2015.

And there's been 26 of those.

How many were called strikes?

13.

How many were called balls?

One.

And it's this pitch.

First pitch.

In recovery.

Recorded history to cross the plate at that axis and be called the ball.

The rest were swung at.

So the call is out of the ump's hands or put in play or whatever.

Here's a look.

And there is strike three.

Two.

Oh, good fastball.

Yeah.

Friday afternoon.

And now faces Juan Soto.

Take strike one here in Cleveland.

I had been my first game.

Strike all.

Warned himself another inning.

Come hit a home run.

He's got two hits today.

Have ready.

Kyle Lewis takes a strike.

Strike three.

Fastball painted.

That's a lot.

So real Muto's just, he's like, Hey, bring it again, man.

He's not going to get it wrong again.

No way.

Same pitch.

I'll flash the glove up.

You go there.

Boom.

God, I'm struck him out three times.

Oh, the fuck is that?

It's the same as the other two.

Oh, fuck, come on.

And yeah, here's all three pitches.

Ah, they're pretty similar.

They're pretty similar.

Unbelievable.

And what's different.

The setup.

And should this really be causing that many problems?

Should it, should it be causing that many problems?

No.

All right.

Well, he's like, it's three and two.

I've thrown five strikes.

I got to throw a breaking ball.

Get swing and miss.

Gets a swing.

Doesn't get the miss.

It's still in the zone.

He's thrown six pitches in the zone.

He's got to go more in the zone and that finds bat and that's a single.

And that's first and third struck about three times.

Now you've got the go ahead, run on third.

They're yucking it up.

Topper's not, he's annoyed.

The pitcher's not, he's frustrated.

Pitching coach is going to walk out, give him a breather.

He's also going to say, all right, boys, let me know when he's looking.

All right, let's, uh, we're going to take our sweet time because those are strikes.

Right, JT.

You got those in there.

Yeah, those are strikes.

Okay.

See, JT says they're strikes, they're strikes.

Don't even worry about it.

Let's, uh, let's see what he says.

And then the umpire starts sneaking up.

Topper's like, yeah, let's get a match.

Should I get ejected?

And then the ump comes and you could see Kirkering's eyes go big right here.

Like, is he coming?

He's coming.

And you see Stott and Bryce be like, I don't want any part of this.

This is going to get ugly.

I'm out of here.

And then Phil Cousy saunters up the hill and it doesn't get that ugly.

He kind of just says, uh, those are strikes and we need you to call them.

We respect you.

You're a long time veteran of the game.

Nothing but love for you, Phil.

But in this moment on those pitches, we need strikes.

Topper's like, I should get ejected, right?

Is that's kind of crazy.

Should I get ejected?

Phil Cousy behind the dish and real Moodle's like, actually guys in fields in, cause this

is the go ahead run on third now.

So that stinks because we struck him out three times, three, one pitch and another breaking

ball that slips out of his hands and hits the batter.

Same thing.

And he does a nice spin, move a big old pirouette.

Ah, ah, Ramos got more hurt than Flores did for Scott hit, but Ramos got hurt.

That's some sympathy pain.

They must be really dear friends.

Now it's bases loaded.

No out infield in, ah, it's too, it's too soft to come home too soft to turn a double

play.

I mean, too slow and awkwardly.

Two trays left.

So he'd have to spin and fire.

Maybe he does that, but you also could botch the throw, get the two outs.

You try for that, but it's, you're not in position to do that.

Now the giants take the lead and you're, you're kind of just left wondering like what the,

what was, how did all of that?

What?

And then the hooligans up and he's looking to do real damage.

And he hits one to Bryce Harper who fields it, tries to come home.

They can't connect.

It's awkward.

Another run scores.

And you know, now it's just like, look what you've done, Phil.

Look what you've done.

We struck him out three times and now they're just bleeding us dry and it did change the

landscape of the game.

You got to make outs and you make pitches and all that, but man, demoralizing strike

out three times.

Harper's like, man, um, stinks everything.

Everything that's happened is, is not good.

And I, I don't like it.

It's not good.

No, not great.

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No.

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