Making Sense of MLB's New Robotic Drama Machine Debuting in 2026

The MLB strike zone is about to learn the same lesson that Bob Dylan famously learned in 1965: Go electric, and everything changes.

After years of teases that robot umpires were coming soon to a ballpark near you, they actually are in 2026 in the form of the Automated Ball-Strike Challenge System. Or "ABS" for short.

The system grants two challenges per team for every game. All it takes is a simple tap on the head by a hitter, pitcher or catcher, so long as it happens within seconds of a call.

What's really interesting, though, is exactly how this brave new robotic world is going to change MLB. As with most things, it's unlikely to be all good or all bad.

How the ABS Will Change MLB for the Better

Fewer Missed Calls, Obviously

The math here isn't complicated. If the ABS results in even one overturned call out of 10,000 tries, that's still a .0001 percent step in the right direction for umpire accuracy and the fairness of the game.

In all likelihood, the actual step in the right direction is going to be much bigger. When the ABS got its big trial run during spring training last year, 52.2 percent of all challenges were successful.

More Drama Is Coming, Too

Not all missed ball-strike calls are created equal. A bad call on an 0-0 pitch is not as impactful as, say, a missed call on a 3-2 pitch.

It was no surprise, then, that challenges last spring were mostly made in higher-leverage counts such as 2-2 and 3-2. The twist is that only 44 percent of those challenges were successful, compared to a 57 percent success rate on first pitches.

If this pattern holds, we're going to see inherently emotional moments infused with even more emotion by way of a sudden high-stakes dice roll.

Audiences will be overcome with that much more tension, resulting in either more joy or more rage at the outcome.

New Skills Will Be Unlocked

As for the best practices when it comes to the ABS, last year's success rates hint at a clear pecking order for who should feel comfortable challenging calls:

1. Catchers: 56 percent
2. Hitters: 50 percent
3. Pitchers: 41 percent

Catchers have the best view of each pitch, as well as the knowledge of whether it hit its target. And between hitters and pitchers, only the former's judgment is not clouded by where the pitch was supposed to go. Chris Sale knows this.

We're soon going to find out which players are good and bad at using the ABS, and there are going to be consequences either way. The bad ones are likely to have their challenge privileges limited, if not revoked outright. The good ones, on the other hand, could get carte blanche to challenge as much as they want.

How the ABS Could Change MLB for the Worse

Games Will Get a Little Longer, Slower

During spring training last year, the average ABS challenge took 13.8 seconds. That means the total lost amount of time in games could amount to minutes.

Though teams start each game with two challenges apiece, they only lose challenges if they're unsuccessful. That's how you get averages of 4.1 challenges and 57 seconds of lost time from last year's spring experiment.

Accordingly, MLB is about to lose some of the time- and pace-of-game gains it has made since the pitch clock arrived in 2023. The trade-off could be worth it, but it's still going to be a nuisance.

The ABS Strike Zone Could Have Problems

For reference, here are the measurements for the ABS challenge zone:

Width: 17 inches
Depth: 8.5 inches from the front of the plate
Top: 53.5 percent of the batter's height
Bottom: 27 percent of the batter's height

It sounds straightforward, and there is a plan to make sure players' sizes are as accurate as possible. But when it comes to how the ABS accounts for hitting stances, Sal Frelick is among those who have concerns: "If you're a guy who likes to get really low in his stance, they still take the frame from when you were just standing upright."

Batters aren't used to thinking of their strike zone as existing in direct proportion to their height, but rather by its rulebook standards: "the midpoint between a batter's shoulders and the top of the uniform pants."

These two things are not the same, and it could lead to confusion at the least and actual problems at the worst. If the latter happens, it shouldn't be the hitters who have to adapt to the ABS, but rather the other way around.

This Feels Like a Scandal Waiting to Happen

Wagers are going to be won and lost on ABS challenges, and that raises understandable concerns about how expanded betting could affect the sport, given ongoing debates about gambling's influence on MLB.

If more Emmanuel Clases don't emerge within the game, there's a real risk that ABS challenges that go against bettors could intensify the kind of heckling players are already dealing with, and players have previously reported receiving serious threats tied to gambling outcomes.

Given MLB's recent history with sign‑stealing controversies, it's natural to wonder if teams might someday try to game the ABS system, but there are protocols in place to prevent that:

• 5-second delay for pitch location data on MLB Gameday
• 9-second delay for TV broadcasts
• Broadcasts will still have a strike-zone box, but it will not indicate whether a pitch was a ball or a strike according to ABS zone.

Even so, it only takes one team to come up with an enterprising idea for how to hack the ABS in some way. Baseball's history of "if you ain't cheating, you ain't trying" is way too deep to be so naive as to dismiss the possibility entirely.

Yet for all its potential unintended consequences, the ABS is a good idea that's been a long time coming. And as long as it does have the benefits of more accuracy, greater drama and more advanced strategy, this is a genie that won't be going back in the bottle.