Ángel Hernández Had an Astonishingly Terrible Game, Even by His Low Standards

What more can you say about umpire Ángel Hernández at this point? His name has become a punchline among baseball fans, thanks to his reputation for being the worst ump in the majors. But his performance in Thursday‘s game between the Pirates and Nationals was a low point, even for him. 

Both teams were apparently eager to get the game over with—they’re both well out of playoff contention, so it’s tough to blame them. It took only one hour and 50 minutes to play and there was a grand total of one walk issued as players showed little patience at the plate. That meant that Hernández only had to call 93 pitches that were not swung on—and he did so with alarmingly poor accuracy. 

According to Umpire Scorecards, which uses data from MLB, only 65% of the pitches Hernández called strikes were actually strikes. He expanded the zone off both sides of the plate and up, leading to 12 called strikes that should have been ruled balls. 

Umpire: Angel Hernandez
Final: Nationals 0, Pirates 2#NATITUDE // #LetsGoBucs#WSHvsPIT // #PITvsWSH

More stats for this game 👇https://t.co/5YwCmD0PqJ pic.twitter.com/LdnghBWtcx

— Umpire Scorecards (@UmpScorecards) September 15, 2023

Here’s a collection of some of those missed calls. 

Umpire Angel Hernandez called the worst game of the season yesterday and the worst since April 2022.

He only had to make 92 calls, but he missed 16 of them for a correct call rate of 82.6%.#Pirates #Nationals pic.twitter.com/TeTWosSGSD

— Umpire Auditor (@UmpireAuditor) September 15, 2023

All told, Hernández called 78 of 93 pitches correctly. That’s an accuracy rate of 83.9%, his worst in any game this season. 

Hernández was sidelined for more than three months this season due to a back injury and has only been behind the plate for eight games since returning. During that time, he’s made the right call 91.1% of the time, the worst accuracy rate in the majors this season, according to Umpire Scorecards. 

Hernández’s reputation is perhaps a bit overblown. Last season, he ranked in the middle of the pack among big league umps with a 93.4% accuracy rate. But there’s no denying that he was awful in Pittsburgh on Thursday.