Umpire Carlos Torres didn’t exactly impress during his World Series game behind the plate — and it appeared to cost the Yankees in some spots.
Torres, who worked the 2022 World Series as a replay official but made his debut as a Fall Classic umpire during Game 1 on Friday night, had an overall accuracy of 93 percent with 11 missed calls during the Dodgers’ 6-3 walk-off win, according to Umpire Scorecards.
Seven of the pitches he called strikes were actually balls, while four of the pitches he called balls were actually strikes, according to his report card.
And the three most impactful missed calls, which Umpire Scorecards described as having the “largest changes in run expectancy” all occurred during the top of the first inning — when a 1-0 pitch to Juan Soto was called a strike instead of a ball, when a 3-1 pitch to Giancarlo Stanton was called a strike instead of a ball and when a 1-1 pitch to leadoff batter Gleyber Torres was called a strike instead of a ball.
In that same frame, he botched a call on the first pitch Jazz Chisholm Jr. faced from Jack Flaherty, with Chisholm flashing bunt before pulling back and Torres — a 46-year-old who made his MLB debut as an umpire in 2015 — called a pitch outside of the zone a strike.
Still, despite those missed calls, Stanton and Soto both reached base in the opening frame to give the Yankees their first scoring chance with two outs and Chisholm at the plate, but the struggling third baseman grounded out to end the frame.
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And Torres’ gaffes didn’t stop the Yankees from taking a 3-2 lead in the 10th and being one Nestor Cortes out away from escaping Game 1 with a victory, before Aaron Boone opted to intentionally walk Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman sent Cortes’ next pitch 409 feet over the right-field fence for a walk-off grand slam.
Torres finished the regular season with a 94.2 percent accuracy, which sat in the 68th percentile but ranked as the third-best among the seven-man umpire crew for the World Series, according to Umpire Scorecards.
He won’t work another game behind the plate this series as the crew continues to rotate, starting with Game 2 when Andy Fletcher will call pitches.
Crew chief Mark Carlson, Doug Eddings, Mark Ripperger, Chad Fairchild and Todd Tichenor will then work Games 3-7, according to the Associated Press.