How Texas A&M Baseball Will Utilize ABS in the SEC Tournament

Texas A&M baseball snapped its five-series winning streak after dropping a second-straight game to then-No. 8 Auburn on May 3.

In the bottom of the ninth, the Aggies faced a 5-4 deficit, with junior third baseman Gavin Grahovac representing the game-winning run. With a 1-2 count, the California kid struck out looking on a questionable strike three call. Appalled by the verdict, head coach Michael Earley stormed the field, only to be ejected for arguing with the umpire.

“I didn’t think it was a very good call,” Earley said after the game. “It was pretty late. It didn’t look like a strike to me. We had, right now, the best player in cleats up to bat with a chance to win the game.”

With questionable strike zones scattered throughout College baseball, the Southeastern Conference made a notable change to its umpiring procedures ahead of its conference tournament on May 19.

SEC To Use ABS for Conference Baseball Tournament

The umpire watches as Tennessee's Cal Stark (10) tags Texas A&M's Jackson Appel (20) out at home plate during the MCWS. — The umpire watches as Tennessee's Cal Stark (10) tags Texas A&M's Jackson Appel (20) out at home plate during a NCAA College World Series game between Tennessee and Texas A&M at Charles Schwab Field in Omaha, Neb., on Saturday, June 22, 2024. | Brianna Paciorka/News Sentinel / USA TODAY NETWORK

“The SEC is on the forefront of making our game mirror professional baseball,” Earley said in a press conference on May 7. “They’re ahead of everyone on it. They do an awesome job. They want us to be playing the same game.”

Similar to Major League Baseball, the SEC will implement a challenge system for balls and strikes for each game of the conference tournament in Hoover, Alabama.

Teams will be given the ability to challenge an umpire’s strike or ball call via an automated ball tracking system that monitors the exact location of each pitch, relative to the specific batter’s zone.

“I like it,” Earley said. “We don’t have the minor leagues, so there’s no better way to do this. The biggest difference is … the umpires have used TrackMan all year, and the hitters have trained on TrackMan … ABS is Hawk-Eye … it’s going to be a different zone, which is obviously not ideal, but I don’t think there’s a better way to do it.”

TrackMan is a ball tracking system used throughout the SEC that relies on radar technology to measure a ball’s trajectory and speed. However, TrackMan is slowly being replaced by another, more accurate ball tracking system, Hawk-Eye, which uses high-speed, high-resolution cameras to capture 3D data on a pitch’s location and spin rate.

The MLB transitioned from TrackMan to Hawk-Eye in 2020, with College baseball following closely behind.

“Eventually we’ll all have Hawk-Eye at all of our parks, and ABS will be a part of the game,” Earley said. “It’s never going to be perfect, but you have to do it, and its coming … eventually it will get to the point where its a good system … ours happens to be in a tournament where teams are fighting to get better postseason positions or get in the postseason, where in Major League Baseball they have the luxury of using the minor leagues … but again, we don’t have any other way to do it, so I think it’s a good thing.”

With a change to the strike zone this late into the season, many teams will be forced to adjust their style of play. But luckily for A&M, the adjustment will be universal.

“We’re going to study and do the best we can, and that will definitely be evolving as it becomes part of our game,” Earley said. “We’ve talked to four different Major League organizations already, just looking for strategic ways on how they do things. Every team is different … there will be a strategic element of it … you want to make sure you use [challenges] in leverage situations and not run out.”

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