By Nate Sanchez
Sports Columnist

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Baseball is a sport unlike any other. Game length is not held hostage by the hands of time. It’s the only sport where a nine-on-one matchup doesn’t always favor numbers. Even the playing field is different. Thirty vibrant green diamonds, each one more unique than the next, act as a reprieve from the rectangular norm.

The culture surrounding baseball is a special one in that it clutches more nostalgically to its past than other sports. But baseball, as close to its past as it wants to be, has finally been forced to change with the times.

The 2014 season will be the first in Major League Baseball’s history to partially take the reigns from the hands of the umpires. Instant replay has been used to review home runs since 2008, but MLB decided to enact its expanded use to any close calls beginning at the start of the 2014 season.

The expansion will include a football-style challenge system. Managers now have the opportunity to challenge a play before the seventh inning. Any challenges past that point are up to the umpires. While this has been brought with rejoicing and refusal alike from fans, it’s proven to be effective so far.

Replay works, but it’s not perfect. The Red Sox-Yankees series this weekend proved it.

When Yankees’ shortstop Dean Anna slid into second base on Saturday, he was called safe despite briefly removing his foot from the base while Red Sox infielder Xander Bogaerts maintained the tag. Red Sox manager John Farrell challenged, but the ruling from MLB Headquarters upheld the call.

Yesterday, MLB released a statement regretting the call with an admission of being in the wrong, claiming that the call was upheld because “the conclusive angle was not immediately available.”

Another thing about replay’s expansion is that it takes away from the theatrics of the game. Since managers and umpires have been given second chances to take a closer look at calls, the days of Lou Piniella-esque ejections over arguing crappy calls may be nearing their close.

Umpires, if asked nicely, can officially review close plays that would have warranted a good ol’ fashioned dirt-kicking, profanity-laced word war in the old days. Those arguments are as much a part of the game as the ball itself, and their presence will no doubt start to dwindle as time goes on and the replay system is refined.

A major criticism of baseball has always been that the umpires are too powerful. They lord over the outcome of the game and their rulings went unchallenged for most of the game’s history. Replay is slowly starting to change that, and I like it. However, calling balls and strikes is a skill that despite having the technology to do so via replay, remains in the umpires’ hands, which I also like. The game needs a human element to judge the day-to-day happenings of each game. Baseball’s studies show that umpires get 99 percent of calls correct anyway.

Of course, that depends on which fans you ask.