MLB Replay Not Taken Far Enough

Officiating is difficult...no question.  I don't need to explain why, anyone who is reading this article knows it already. 

I've been listening to FSR this morning, (only because my local sports station is currently playing a mind numbing horse racing show, which followed a fishing show that makes me want to put an M-80 in each ear canal and fire those bad boys off.)  The topic of replay in MLB came up.  A caller mentioned that he would like to see a computer making ball/strike calls.  That caller was blown off the air and the FSR "talent" completely dismissed this thought saying in summary that taking the home plate umpire and his ball/strike calls out of the game would take emotion from the game.  He also said that he was not sure a computer could determine balls and strikes better than an umpire.

Really?  I mean.....Really?  We can split atoms and build space stations but we can't build a computer to tell whether a baseball was in the strike zone when it crosses home plate?  Come on FSR...where do you get these guys?  I'd give you his name but I've been listening for an hour (painfully) and he hasn't said his name once.  BTW, he just called something "gobbledy-gook".

I don't think this caller was implying that the home plate umpire should be removed from the game entirely.  Picture this, an umpire walks to the plate with a small microphone in his ear.  When the ball crosses the plate, the beautiful computer voice says "ball" or "strike" and the umpire makes his call.  As a fan, you don't even notice a difference in the game and it eliminates blown ball/strike calls.  Tell me how that takes emotion out of the game.

I'm going to take this one step further.  Wouldn't you love to see replay used to challenge safe/out calls at the bases and home plate?  What if managers got one replay challenge per game, and if the challenge fails their team loses an out in the following inning?  A harsh penalty sure, but it needs to be.

I doubt anyone wants to take the officials on-field judgement out of the game entirely, but face it, sometimes they blow calls.  I know it, you know it, and they know it but after they make the call they can't change it even if they know it was questionable.  

Challenges have worked very well in the NFL, haven't they?