MLB to Usher in Ball-Strike Challenge System on Opening Night of 2026 Season

In hopes of getting the umpire’s calls right, the system lets players initiate a challenge. Like the DH and the pitch clock, it’s a bid to improve the game.

The scoreboard displays the Automated Ball-Strike Challenge System during a challenge by the Los Angeles Dodgers in the first inning of a game against the Cleveland Guardians at Camelback Ranch in Glendale, Arizona, on March 11, 2025. Christian Petersen/Getty Images

When the MLB regular season begins later this month, watch for players tapping their batting helmets or catchers’ helmets, as the Automatic Ball-Strike (ABS) Challenge System powered by T-Mobile debuts. MLB history will be made on March 25 when the San Francisco Giants host the New York Yankees in the season opener broadcast on Netflix.

Change is inevitable. It was more than 5o years ago, in 1973, when the designated hitter rule made its way into the American League. Pitchers no longer would bat, and one hitter in the lineup wouldn’t play the field. On April 6, 1973, at Boston’s Fenway Park, with pitcher Luis Tiant on the mound facing the New York Yankees’ Ron Bloomberg in the batter’s box, MLB history was made. The DH rule was adopted by the National League in 2022.