If the umpire’s goal was to not allow a perfect inning, then why not call a ball on one of the prior pitches that were right on the edge of the strike zone?
that was like the second batter and fifth pitch, right? immaculate innings are super unlikely and incredibly rare. there has been something like 3 times as many no hitters.
still waiting to hear from wheatrich what’s wrong with my brain though
like i dont know if people here are super up to date with the scumbag practices of a lot of these books, especially the apps, and particularly draftkings. guarantee a push notification went off for some live bonus on immaculate inning at +50 trillion or whatever dark pattern bs bonus thing they offer, it comes close to hitting, do you think books want that last pitch to hit? would be a bloodbath. then on the 9th pitch he just magically misses a middle middle fastball call ?
if it’s not incredibly clear again my point is that these things should be looked at closer way before a book (who absolutely should not be trusted) starts complaining about 2 random pitches from some league minimum bozo than immediately dismissed as some sort of impossibility, especially in an era where people still believe shohei did something wrong. and yes im aware this was kicked off by a betting integrity firm, but those guys work closely with these books and are usually financially in bed with them too.
“Umpire is in real time calculating sportsbooks collective handle and risk on obscure prop bets” seems way way less likely than “Umpires make mistakes all the time” or more specifically “It’s an 0-2 count, he’s probably anticipating either a breaking ball down or a fastball to miss high. The ump sees the fastball up in the zone, his initial thought is that it’s going to miss the zone to induce a chase swing and miss, and he calls it a ball even though it was well in the zone”
1 Like
Not even close to what I’m saying might be happening but whatever. people here read what they want to and lack any kind of imagination or curiosity. must be my messed up brain!
I just don’t know any other interpretation of this than “Sportsbooks offer some super longshot odds on a sucker bet because that sucker bet almost never actually happens, then when it comes close to happening the sportsbooks influence the outcome to make sure it doesn’t happen”.
In that scenario I’m not sure there’s any possible way for the sportsbooks to influence the call other than conspiring with the umpire to blow an obvious strike call.
What I’d really love to know is how the sportsbook and umpire know that there will even be a ball/strike call to be made. Is the batter in on it too, and knows not to swing? The whole hypothesis is ridiculous. Also makes me think jmakin has never been on a sportsbook if thinks that mid-inning, they are offering live “Immaculate Inning? Yes/No” props at massively long odds.
It seems he’s just upset that Shohei was found to be a degenerate gambler. But honestly, they found a way to work around that whole thing and keep him playing for the Dodgers, so I’d be happy about how it ended up if I was an LA fan.
I’m mostly impressed with the pitcher’s control - to hide his disbelief and not show up the umpire
Last winter I was playing poker at a table with a 20-something guy who was talking basketball and sports betting with the dealer. When someone mentioned the World Series, he stated emphatically that Aaron Judge’s dropped fly ball had to have been intentional, since there was no other explanation for his missing the ball. He wasn’t joking, as he kept defending his assertion for close to 10 minutes even as multiple players told him he was being silly.
Believing in conspiracies is a powerful drug.
I’ve had to stop going into a few tiger places during games because people get as mad as they do for a NFL or CFB loss when the baseball teams loses. And we’ve sucked for a long time very recently
1 Like
if a baseball team wins 3 out of 4 over a season they’d be the all time best ever. let’s get mad when they lose one game.
and the tigers have the best record, the only team winning better than 5 out of 8 games. Even the dodgers trillion dollars or whatever it is aren’t doing this ffs
this is also why I’ve laughed at tanking in general in sports though, the casual fan don’t care, they want to win now. Even if they shouldn’t.
1 Like
I gotta agree with jmakin here. I don’t necessarily think it had to do with gambling props, but it definitely seems way less likely for a professional mlb umpire to miss such an easy -right down the middle of the strike zone- call than for (Ortiz?) to throw an outlier pitch imo
Something seems fishy. Maybe he just doesn’t like the pitcher?
Why wait until the last pitch when everyone is watching instead of the first or second pitch when only fans are watching?
Agree there are a lot of reasons he could have called it a ball. Maybe he doesn’t like Yamamoto. Maybe he wanted to show everyone who’s boss. Maybe he blacked out for a moment. Maybe he was thinking about his dinner reservations and got distracted.
There are no reasonable explanations that relate to betting, however.
1 Like
This is what I think. I don’t think he saw the pitch and said “that’s a ball”, I think he didn’t really “see” it at all.
1 Like
I hate armchair quarterbacks and I’m not gonna say how easy something is or I could’ve done it. I’ve never umped a baseball game. But if this is your profession, how do you miss that?! Was he distracted by a fan or something else? If his eyes were open and he doing what he’s supposed to be doing, I don’t see how he can miss it
Maybe I’m misapplying Occam’s razor here, but simplest answer to me is that he didn’t want an immaculate inning for whatever reason. Not that he looks the ball right down the middle of his own strike zone and called it a ball
The simplest answer is that he just messed up.
2 Likes
Lol at categorizing this as “believing in conspiracies.” Aren’t I like 5 posts back saying I think epstein killed himself? (same as i said years ago)
Lots of people here seem to be purposely misinterpreting what I am actually saying. I’ll get to gloat eventually, bookmarked a ton of posts.
Anyone that thinks its implausible that the many many billions of dollars of interest bookmakers have that also drive massive amounts of revenue to every major sport don’t have a few guys on payroll is huffing paint. nope, impossible, conspiracy theory. Betting integrity term paid by the same guys flags one random betting pattern on a no name pitcher? Totally plausible. nevermind that the same arguments used against me here also apply to that situation.
never change, UP.
Shit happens. The easiest explanation is that the ump made a mistake. Mistakes don’t need reasons.
shit happens. the easiest explanation is that cortez threw a bad pitch. mistakes dont need reasons.
1 Like
Yes I feel you big on this every time ive tried to regularly watch games at dodger spots. dodger games at the stadium, emotion is understandable. or maybe a fiery padres rivalry game. but if you’re going into histrionics at the result of a single fucking pre august game you’re legitimately nuts to me. i suspect a lot of it is driven by homerism gambling.
would love to see dodgers and detroit face off post season, need a new rivarly. i dont mind losing to teams like that even in a ws so it’s a less stressful experience for me. the padres one is too toxic and the astros one is tired because they arent good.