MLB is testing a challenge system this spring training. Cubs pitcher Cody Poteet challenged a ball call on a pitch to Max Muncy, and got it successfully changed to a strike upon review.
Major League Baseball is testing the automatic ball-strike (ABS) challenge system at several ballparks during spring training, potentially a precursor to the majors adding a system that has been used the last few years in Triple-A.
The ABS system was installed in 60 percent of MLB parks for spring training, which Evan Drellich at The Athletic reported back in January. One of those parks is Camelback Ranch, so expect it to be used in several Dodgers games this spring. Each team starts the game with two challenges, and if you are incorrect you lose that challenge. Teams can theoretically keep challenging as long as they are correct.
On Thursday, the Dodgers and Cubs were the only spring training game on the schedule, and we got our first challenge ever in the majors.
Prior to the game, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts told reporters at Camelback Ranch that the only player on the team he told not to use the challenge was Max Muncy, the player with the most discerning eye on the team. Tim Neverett on the SportsNet LA broadcast described Roberts as being tongue-in-cheek as he said it.
So naturally the first challenge came with Muncy at the plate in the first inning. It was an 0-1 fastball called low. It wasn’t Muncy who challenged, but rather Cubs pitcher Cody Poteet.
Here was the first ABS challenge of Spring Training:
Cody Poteet challenged a called ball by tapping his head. It went to a review. Umpire Tony Randazzo announced it was overturned to a strike.
Simple. Easy. Efficient.
— Sam Dykstra (@samdykstramilb.bsky.social) 2025-02-20T20:37:22.951Z
The challenge was successful, and the pitch was called a strike. Muncy later struck out in the at-bat.
This will be something to watch all spring as teams try to work out the kinks. Dodgers right-hander Landon Knack, who made his major league debut last season, has seen the challenge system in Triple-A in both 2023 and 2024. He was one of several players who talked with Rowan Kavner at Fox Sports about the ABS challenge system:
“It’s currently a little inconsistent,” Dodgers pitcher Landon Knack said. “Ballpark to ballpark, it would not be calibrated the same. So, you’d go some places and it’d be higher or lower. You go to some places, and it’s actually moved over an inch or two.”
Knack also said in his experience, the zone tended to be smaller than the one he’s been accustomed to growing up, often taking away calls he’d normally get at the top of the zone. As a pitcher whose fastball lives in the mid-to-low 90s, command and precision are especially vital. A couple calls that go against him on the edges can make or break a start.