{"id":571550,"date":"2026-02-14T04:37:21","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T04:37:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/571550\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T04:37:21","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T04:37:21","slug":"braves-chris-sale-signals-true-feelings-on-abs-challenge-system-im-not-an-umpire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/571550\/","title":{"rendered":"Braves&#8217; Chris Sale signals true feelings on ABS challenge system: &#8216;I&#8217;m not an umpire&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/mlb\/atlanta-braves\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Atlanta Braves<\/a> pitcher Chris Sale apparently hates MLB&#8217;s <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/story\/_\/id\/47914496\/mlb-unveils-abs-challenge-system-guidelines-2026-season\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">implementation of the ABS challenge system<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>So much so, the lefty vows to never make a single challenge when he&#8217;s on the mound during the upcoming season.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Thought this was interesting from the <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Braves?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#Braves<\/a> clubhouse today: Chris Sale says he will never challenge a pitch being a ball or strike despite new challenge system in MLB this season. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/V0CT1Xct4i\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/V0CT1Xct4i<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Justin Felder (@Justin_FOX5) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Justin_FOX5\/status\/2022399699144307144?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">February 13, 2026<\/a>  <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I will never challenge a pitch. I will never do it,&#8221; Sale told reporters, including Justin Felder of Fox Sports 5, on Friday. When asked why he would never consider it, Sale had a blunt response:\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Because I&#8217;m not an umpire,&#8221; Sale said. &#8220;That&#8217;s their job. I&#8217;m a starting pitcher. I&#8217;ve never called balls and strikes in my life.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Sale credits catchers for stealing strikes\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Even as one of the best starting pitchers of the last decade, Sale knows he receives help from his catchers&#8217; framing abilities.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Catchers nowadays, the way they catch the ball and the way they receive, they make them all look like strikes,&#8221; Sale added.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Atlanta&#8217;s starting backstop, <a target=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/mlb\/atlanta-braves\/news\/braves-drake-baldwin-gets-contract-update-aligns-atlanta-precedent\/fd31364095cbeb626047e0f1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">2025 NL Rookie of the Year Drake Baldwin<\/a>, finished in the 45th percentile in MLB in pitch framing. Backup Sean Murphy ranked in the 71st percentile.<\/p>\n<p>Will Sale allow his catchers to challenge pitches, or is he against the idea as a whole?\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>More MLB news:<\/p>\n<p>                            <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Atlanta Braves pitcher Chris Sale apparently hates MLB&#8217;s implementation of the ABS challenge system.\u00a0 So much so, the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":101664,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2394],"tags":[191,46,4166,5,192,4],"class_list":{"0":"post-571550","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-atlanta-braves","8":"tag-atlanta","9":"tag-atlanta-braves","10":"tag-atlantabraves","11":"tag-baseball","12":"tag-braves","13":"tag-mlb"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116067136281142153","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571550","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571550"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571550\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101664"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571550"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571550"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571550"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}