If the first few hours of baseball for the 2023 MLB season are any indication, we’re going to see some weird situations play out when it comes to the new rules.
The New York Mets got a quick lesson in that on Thursday.
During the Opening Day matchup between the Mets and Marlins, some confusion sparked after home plate umpire Larry Vanover stopped play and charged a strike to Jeff McNeil. The violation in the case had nothing to do with McNeil. But instead, Vanover thought that Pete Alonso was taking too long to return to first base after McNeil’s foul ball. The penalty for that was a strike charged to … McNeil.
It's chaos time in Miami pic.twitter.com/0JtBA9rdu4
— Dillard Barnhart (@BarnHasSpoken2) March 30, 2023
Alonso, McNeil, the Mets broadcast and manager Buck Showalter were all justifiably confused with the ruling. Alonso did walk back to first base, but it didn’t look like he was holding up the game.
Here's a good angle from the Marlins broadcast of the automatic strike called on Alonso.
McNeil fouls a ball off, Alonso makes his way to second base but doesn't get back to first base quickly enough so an automatic strike is called. pic.twitter.com/sQQOaaL4N3
— Alex Fast (@AlexFast8) March 30, 2023
Really, Vanover’s decision to call a violation in that spot, charge the strike and then explain the ruling to the Mets caused more a delay than Alonso’s quick walk back to first base.
Despite the extra strike, McNeil would get a hit in that at-bat to put the Mets up by three runs.
McHits are SO back 🐿️ pic.twitter.com/8uxwg00gfe
— New York Mets (@Mets) March 30, 2023
Fans also had plenty of thoughts on that ruling by Vanover.
This was how Twitter reacted
it rocks that we gave umps even more ammo for their power trips https://t.co/ABdU8YFSjc
— Jake (@JakeWallinger) March 30, 2023
I'm a fan of most new rules related to pace, but this is quite stupid.
On the other hand, it happened to the Mets so… https://t.co/Xlz28Tcco3
— Tommy Poe (@WalkOffWalk1) March 30, 2023
what a ridiculous call https://t.co/FUi8GGaMfV
— Gabe Miller (@gmiller_92) March 30, 2023
I love how this creates an unnecessary delay. https://t.co/y5163YiYKq
— Kenta Hagiwara (@KentraHagatra) March 30, 2023
There's no way that's a rule. Ump had to make that up on the spot. https://t.co/FIGrAqr8u2
— Max (Kelenic propagandist) (@MaxC_206) March 30, 2023
The game will probably be the same speed that we had before because MLB made this rule and everyone is going to argue because it’s ridiculous to even have these rules
Quit changing baseball man https://t.co/nW2hqbQIZb
— Baylor Giannini (@BaylorGiannini) March 30, 2023
Took more time arguing and since when was that added to the pitch clock rules? Players and teams don’t even know what’s going on it’s embarrassing https://t.co/2oLJlfkTyj
— Bryan Padilla (@bryanpcreative) March 30, 2023
Might just be the stupidest new rule of all. https://t.co/qfuFV4slVv
— Michelle D. H.🫐💙💛 (@justmeMDH) March 30, 2023
This season’s gonna have so many controversial calls. Everyone is gonna be talking baseball this year. https://t.co/gSlRtX9k45
— Marla 🦕💤 (@MarlaTalksBall) March 30, 2023
If MLB really wants to improve pace of play, then that rule for baserunners really shouldn’t be a thing. You’re going to see teams waste more time arguing the call than it would have saved.
