Umpire’s ABS nightmare: Bill Miller has 8 pitches challenged, each one overturned

The Cincinnati Reds were celebrating, the Chicago Cubs bullpen was reeling, and home plate umpire Bill Miller was left wondering where everything went wrong after the Reds’ 10-8 win at Wrigley Field on Friday.

That’s because the 27-year veteran and crew chief went 0-for-8 on ABS challenges — three by the Reds and five by the Cubs.

Just nine plate appearances into the Friday matinee, Miller was charged with his first ABS challenge on an 0-1 four-seamer from Cincinnati starter Rhett Lowder on the corner that should’ve been called a strike.

By the end of the ninth inning, seven more were called, all overturned. And of the eight challenges, only two were initially called strikes.

Cubs catcher Carson Kelly challenged four pitches, and Reds backstop Jose Trevino had two calls overturned. Each team had one successful challenge from a batter: the Reds’ Sal Stewart and the Cubs’ Seiya Suzuki.

None of the challenges were initiated by Cincinnati catcher Tyler Stephenson, whose 88 overturns on 124 challenges lead all of baseball. Stephenson and Brewers catcher William Contreras are the only two players with at least 80 successful challenges this season.

Oddly enough, this isn’t the first time this season that Miller has drawn the ire of the Reds.

In the seventh inning of a mid-July game, Reds second baseman Edwin Arroyo ran into Miller while trying to field a grounder, leading to an extended inning for Caleb Ferguson. The left-hander did not take too kindly to Miller impeding Arroyo, and the Mariners’ broadcast caught his expletive-filled tirade.

The next day, Ferguson apologized for his actions, noting that he would seek out Miller to make things right.

“It’s just a very unprofessional thing on my part,” Ferguson said. “I know these things happen in the game, but I don’t like that I was kind of the centerpiece of what was going on.”

Using data gleaned from TapToChallenge.com, a website that tracks Automated Ball-Strike developments, Friday’s game at Wrigley Field is believed to be the worst goose egg by an umpire since MLB introduced the ABS challenge system this season.

Even so, the record for the most overturned calls for an umpire in a single game still belongs to Clint Vondrak, who had 11 of 16 challenges overturned in a June 8 game between the Milwaukee Brewers and Athletics (five from Milwaukee and six from the Athletics).

To his credit, Miller only ranks ninth in total calls overturned with 70. Hunter Wendelstedt, Dan Iassogna, Malachi Moore, Lance Barrett and Manny Gonzalez, in that order, lead the league in total number of overturned challenges.

“These umpires have a really, really, really difficult job,” Stewart told The Athletic at the All-Star Game. “I only have to know my zone; they need to know the whole league’s zone. … I just want to say, man, the umpires have done a great job. This system, it’s not easy. They have to know a lot of people, different heights.”

The Athletic’s C. Trent Rosecrans contributed to this report