Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated
Entertainment
Daniel Chavkin

Umpires Miss Third Strike on Yordan Álvarez, Allow At-Bat to Continue

During the Astros-Red Sox game on Wednesday, something unusual happened without anyone in the game noticing.

With Houston slugger Yordan Álvarez up and Rich Hill on the mound, Álvarez was given the luxury of an extra strike, grounding out to first base on strike four after a called strike three wasn’t declared a strikeout.

The home plate umpire was Jim Wolf, and he apparently just lost track of the count even though Hill only threw five pitches in the entire at bat. However, the fact that neither Hill, nor Álvarez, nor even the broadcast booth caught the mistake is very strange.

Since Álvarez got out on his only extra pitch, the blunder didn’t have much impact outside of costing Hill another strikeout on the day. And by the time this occurred, Hill had already given up four runs, which was enough for Houston to beat Boston 6–1 on the day.

Both Hill and Wolf would be lucky that the error didn’t have more of an impact on Wednesday’s game.

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.