Outraged Fans Call for Umpire Jordan Baker's Firing After Blue Jays-Twins Game
Outraged Fans Call for Umpire Jordan Baker's Firing After Blue Jays-Twins Game originally appeared on Athlon Sports.
Major League Baseball has all but made it clear that the Automated Ball-Strike System isn't coming to the regular season anytime soon.
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Veteran umpire Jordan Baker might be the latest to make league officials reconsider that stance.
The Umpire Auditor X/Twitter account found that Baker missed 19 calls during Friday's Toronto Blue Jays-Minnesota Twins game. Baker notably struck out and subsequently ejected pinch-hitter Ryan Jeffers in the eighth inning after arguing a low strike.
Jeffers represented the tying run in the Blue Jays' eventual 6-4 victory.
The Umpire Scorecard account reported that Baker called 132 of 149 pitches (88.6%) correctly, the 15th-worst performance of any umpire this year. However, both accounts agreed that the Jeffers incident marked the game's most significant missed call.
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Whether Baker missed 17 or 19 missed calls, social media users demanded the league fire the 43-year-old ump.
"Fire all the umps," one fan wrote. "Bring on the computers."
Added another: "Cheat ump that deserves to be fired."
Numerous users argued that Baker's height, at 6 feet 7 inches, could impact his ability to call balls and strikes accurately. Baker is the tallest active MLB umpire, and he's correctly called just over 94% of pitches in 12 games this year.
Home plate umpire Jordan Baker in 2024Jay Biggerstaff-Imagn Images
'He is notorious for missing pitches below the knees,' an X user argued. 'But [the Major League Baseball Umpires Association] ignores this problem & he continues to have trouble calling the low pitches.'
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'He's clearly positioned too low,' commented another. 'His head is below the catchers. How does he expect to see those low pitches accurately?'
Unfortunately for the Twins, they've been involved in two of the worst umpire performances thus far. Adrian Johnson missed 23 of 130 calls (nearly 17.7%) in the Twins' 2-1 victory over the San Francisco Giants on May 10.
'But he won't be punished fined or suspended for incompetence,' read one reply.
Related: Calls Mount for Umpire's Immediate Firing After Rangers-Rays Game
Related: Fans Outraged at Umpire Over Calls in Phillies-Athletics
This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports on Jun 8, 2025, where it first appeared.
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