JP Crawford had a rough night at the plate and wasn’t shy about letting the umpire hear it. In the first inning, he struck out after a couple of controversial calls, clearly frustrated by a strike call on a pitch inside. The fifth inning brought more of the same. With a runner in scoring position and two outs, Crawford took a couple more close pitches that were called strikes and blew up. He was so upset he said, “Your zone’s been wrong every game,” before the manager came out to get between him and home plate ump Doug Eddings.
The comments led to a closer look at Crawford’s history with Eddings behind the plate. In nine games where Eddings called balls and strikes during Crawford’s at-bats, the data shows nine balls called strikes and four strikes called balls. But when focusing on the calls Crawford visibly reacted to — the ones he likely sees as incorrect — that number jumps to 23 perceived missed calls. Eddings was behind the plate in eight of the nine games with at least one of those perceived misses. Crawford clearly believes the strike zone is consistently bad when Eddings is calling it, and the data gives some weight to his frustration. Whether it’s bias, bad luck, or just a clash in perception, Crawford and Eddings don’t seem to be a good match.