When you think about a baseball game, what do you think of? Probably the players, home runs, maybe even the concessions. You might not give much thought to umpires, the people responsible for enforcing game rules, calling balls and strikes, and deciding who is safe or out. Umpires resolve conflicts that arise between coaches or players. Most importantly, they keep the game fair. Currently, this critical role is changing in some exciting ways. Here, btw takes a closer look.
Jen Pawol Makes History
In August 2025, Jen Pawol became the first female umpire in a regular-season Major League Baseball (MLB) game. Over the weekend of August 9-10, Pawol umpired three games between the Florida Marlins and the Atlanta Braves. In the game on Sunday, August 10, which finished out the series, she was behind home plate.
Pawol, 48, began her career playing softball as a catcher at Hofstra University. She went on to play at the Amateur Softball Association Major Fast Pitch level for ten years. Then Pawol made her transition to being an umpire and immediately began breaking barriers. She reached Triple-A minor league baseball in 2023. She was the first woman to accomplish this in 34 years, and only the seventh female umpire in Minor League Baseball history. In 2024, she was the first female umpire in a Triple-A Spring Training game since 2007. In total, she umpired over 1,200 games to work her way up to the Major Leagues.
When she took the field in Atlanta for her first major league game, she received a standing ovation from the crowd during pregame introductions. Pawol told interviewers that it was a dream come true. She donated the cap she wore in the game to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York.
Automatic Challenge System
At the same time, major league baseball is also experimenting with robotic umpires in some of its games. The technology was first introduced in the independent Atlantic League in 2019. But the fans universally didn’t like this system. They wanted to keep human umpires. Today, MLB is exploring something slightly different: the Automatic Ball-Strike (ABS) Challenge System. It is claimed that this technology more accurately calls balls and strikes. The goal is to use precise technology that eliminates the potential for human error.
The ABS Challenge System is kind of a halfway point between human and robotic umpires. With this system, human umpires call balls and strikes, just like always. But if a player thinks that an umpire got a call wrong, they can challenge that call. Teams receive a certain number of challenges per game (to prevent them from challenging every call). Challenges must be made immediately, and only the batter, pitcher, or catcher can challenge the call.
The ABS Challenge System was tested during the 2025 Spring Training season and received positive feedback from fans. As a result, it was used during the All-Star Game in Atlanta in July 2025. Similar types of technology that verifies or overrules human decisions is already being used in professional tennis matches and in professional soccer as well.