Sep 6, 2022; Baltimore, Maryland, USA; Toronto Blue Jays interim manager John Schneider (14) argues with home plate umpire Jeff Nelson after being thrown out of the game during the seventh inning against the Baltimore Orioles at Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Mandatory Credit: Brent Skeen-USA TODAY Sports
There were some big calls made by umpires in some important series this week that could have playoff implications.
This past week saw some very important games, including many head-to-head matchups between MLB playoff teams or playoff hopefuls.
Those include White Sox vs. Mariners, Orioles vs. Blue Jays, Twins vs. Yankees, Rays vs. Yankees, Guardians vs. Twins, and Dodgers vs. Padres. In those series alone, there were a few umpiring calls that could end up impacting the playoff race.
Here are the worst three incidents from the past week.
3 umpiring moments that could impact the MLB playoff picture
3) Orioles vs. Blue Jays for a few different reasons
For this instance, it’s not necessarily a bad call but just a bizarre series of events that lead to an ejection.
The series between the Baltimore Orioles and Toronto Blue Jays had a number of weird incidents. They had bench-clearing ‘brawl’ over nothing and then in the next half inning, interim Blue Jays manager John Schneider got ejected over a called strike … which was correct.
On the evening, home plate umpire and crew chief had 95.7 percent overall accuracy … but the calls that he did miss favored the Blue Jays a lot. They favored the Jays by more than 1.5 runs … and the Jays still lost 9-6.
Really, this was just a dumb ejection that happened after a number of run-ins in the series between the Jays and this umpiring crew this season (as the above video indicates).