Major-league ABS Challenge System to be introduced in 2026

Automated challenge for balls and strikes quickly approved by MLB

One thing is certain with the newest MLB rule change. Legendary umpires Bill Klem and Jocko Conlan would never have been considered for Cooperstown if the ABS Challenge System had been in place back when they were building their Hall-of-Fame reputations, in the first half of the 20^th Century. Overturned ball-strike calls never look good on an umpire’s career summary. No new ump is ever again going to the Hall.

On Tuesday, in New York, MLB confirmed that the Automatic Ball-Strike challenge system had been added for the 2026 regular season and beyond. Glass half-full? This is a far better choice than the full “robo-ump” for determining all balls and strikes which system has been used experimentally over the past seven seasons, down in the lower minors, then on an alternate basis with the ABS at Triple-A.

The ABS challenge system was introduced to MLB this spring training to quietly gauge what the veteran players thought about this inevitable preview of the future. Only pitchers, catchers and hitters have the ability to initiate a challenge and it must be done via a quick hand tap to the hat or helmet. No manager challenge. Bottom line is it will take less time to view the replay of a pitch than it does to currently watch an umpire turn his head to the dugout to listen to the inevitable, angry barking and outrage from managers and pitching coaches.

At spring training, each challenge took less than four seconds and calls were overturned about 50-percent of the time. Blue Jays catcher Alejandro Kirk is never wrong. Teams begin the game with two challenges and retain them if correct. In extra innings, teams get one more challenge every inning. It will hardly be noticed.

There is a huge amount of new strategy that will be brought into the sport on both offence and defence. Given a borderline pitch, you had better be 100-percent correct if you are planning to challenge early in a game, let’s say, in the middle of a count without a walk or a strikeout being directly involved. With that in mind, it’s obvious not every missed call will be challenged. How often have we seen guys contort and spin on strike three, like Vlad Guerrero Jr., and be wrong where replay shows the pitch carves a huge portion of the onscreen pitch-box. Vlad, do not tap.

Bad strategy? Imagine a team wasting its two challenges in the first six innings on meaningless pitch-counts, then at a key moment, late in the game, with the tying or winning run in scoring position, being hosed by the umpire and your team has no challenges left. It brings another level to late-inning strategy.

The bottom line is that the ABS challenge may even improve the performance of current umpires. The men in blue are only human and you see it quite often where, for example, constant badgering from a dugout, like the Yankees and Aaron Boone, can have an effect later in the game where borderline calls start to go in the Bombers direction. Or if a player and an umpire have butted heads and don’t get along, the next borderline pitch can controversially be called a strike. Now it will be challenged.

To my way of thinking, it would also be a great time in broadcast history to remove the strike box from the screen during live action. Too many broadcasters are fixated on telling you at home that a pitch looked like a ball or looked like a strike instead of waxing poetic on the beauty and subtlety of the game. Let the game play itself out, let the players challenge and let the umpires umpire.

This spring, with ABS veteran MLB players liked what they saw. Young players who experienced the system in the minor leagues were already used to it. MLB umpires and their union love it compared to any possible alternative – i.e. full robo-ump”.

There are, in fact, many reasons for fans to like the MLB move and it will become far more acceptable to traditionalists than the option that would have made the home plate arbiter a mere pitch count accountant and glorified ballboy.

Of course, the ABS system has a title-sponsor because… of course it does.