I Can't Believe I Have To Say This Again

Some thoughts on MLB's replay rules:

Takeout Slide Down the Slippery Slope

The Law of Unexpected Consequences broke Ruben Tejada's leg.

I mean, sure, Chase Utley did the actual deed, no doubt finally releasing all that pent-up anger from when John Lannan broke his hand and knocked him out of the playoffs in 2007, but that's not the point. Or at least not this point.

A Game Design Perspective on Baseball's New Instant Replay Proposal

Here are some basic rules of game design:

• Simple and elegant is always better than complicated and filled with special cases.
• Be aware of unintended consequences
• Playtest and prototype the hell out of things before you release them to your audience
• Don't train your players to do one thing, and then unexpectedly turn around and penalize them for doing what you've taught them to

No More Clevelands

There are two possible conclusions that can be drawn from last night's umpiring fiasco in Cleveland, and they are predicated on whether or not umpiring crew chief Angel Hernandez is full of it. Hernandez, partially off the record, said that the replay they had of Josh Donaldson's home-run-that-was-ruled-a-double was inconclusive, and privately grumbled to Jayson Stark that the equipment the umps have for doing instant replay reviews is subpar for the job.
If Hernandez is full of it - and he does  not exactly have a spotless track record - then he deliberately sandbagged the call because he didn't want to be overturned by replay. That's unacceptable professional behavior and baseball shouldn't put up with it. Fans come to the ballpark expecting to see a fair contest, millions of dollars are on the line with playoff spots, and having a team's fate hinge on a case of "Idowanna" makes no sense. So someone needs to get in there, see the replays that Hernandez and his crew saw, and determine if they were actually good enough to show what happened.
If, on the other hand, Hernandez is telling the truth and the equipment was subpar - worse angles than the TV cameras and worse equipment to view it on - then this is also unacceptable. If umps are making calls that decide the outcomes of games on 17" black and white Zeniths with rabbit ears, that needs to stop right now. MLB can pay for one less "surprise appearance" by Puddle of Mudd at the MLB Fan Cave, rip a few of those flatscreens off the wall, and distribute them to the umpires' clubhouses so they can get the goddamn calls right.
It isn't hard, people. One thing or the other has to stop. Figure out which and do it.
Now.