Angel Hernandez's missed call led to a home run in his first game back behind the plate

Longtime MLB umpire Angel Hernandez has been absent for nearly the entire season thus far after dealing with a medical matter. He made his return to big-league action this past weekend, and on Wednesday, he was back behind the plate for the first time in 2023.

It didn’t take long for a missed call to make an impact.

Now, until MLB institutes an automated strike zone (robot umps), you’re almost never going to see an umpire go an entire game without missing a call. It’s only happened once since Ump Scorecards started tracking performance. But Hernandez has a knack for impacting games with his missed calls.

Ángel Hernández is back behind the plate in a big league game for the first time in almost ten months.

He misses the call on a 1-1 pitch and the next pitch is a homer. pic.twitter.com/wLKT0VW5y1

— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) August 2, 2023

With MacKenzie Gore on the mound for the Nationals, he should have gotten ahead in the count when his 1-1 pitch in the strike zone was called a ball by Hernandez. There’s a huge difference between a 2-1 count and a 1-2 count from a pitcher’s perspective, and Gore paid that price on the very next pitch. He left a 2-1 fastball up high in the zone, which Tyrone Taylor drove for a 396-foot home run.

MLB SLG on 1-2 pitches is .252.
MLB SLG on 2-1 pitches is .565.

— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) August 2, 2023

Again, Hernandez was never going to be perfect in the game, but a missed call in that spot had to be frustrating for Gore and the Nationals.

Fans certainly didn’t have any problem piling on Hernandez for the missed call.