Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol could not hold his tongue about Ron Kulpa’s absurd strike zone Friday

Those who tuned into Friday night’s matchup between the St. Louis Cardinals and Arizona Diamondbacks were left scratching their heads as to whether home plate umpire Ron Kulpa was watching the same game as everybody else.

It did not take Oliver Marmol long to decide he had seen enough.

With a man on first base in the bottom of the fourth inning, Kulpa punched out Iván Herrera on a pivotal 3-2 pitch on a delivery that was multiple inches below any reasonable strike zone.

Herrera couldn’t believe he had been called out, but after his initial stunned reaction, he walked off to the home dugout with minimal protestations.

Marmol didn’t get tossed at that point, either. But when the very next pitch to Alec Burleson ended up in an almost identical spot—arguably, it actually landed a little closer to the zone than the one to Herrera had—and was ruled a ball, that was more than Marmol could stand to stay quiet about.

Whatever comparisons Marmol was busy making from the Cardinals dugout, Kulpa wasn’t a fan. He ejected the Cardinals manager from the proceedings, leading to Marmol emerging from the dugout to get every bit of his money’s worth during an animated back-and-forth on the playing surface.

I’m no expert lip reader, but given the clarity of the cameras on the Apple TV+ broadcast, let’s just say that I’m pretty confident in my evaluation that Marmol suggested to Kulpa, in no uncertain terms, that he should undergo what we’ll call a… rapid maturation process.

In fairness, Kulpa’s zone was rough on both sides in the early going of Friday’s game as Miles Mikolas seemed to benefit from calls that puzzled Arizona batters on a couple of occasions. 

Corbin Carroll had to be left wondering how he had personally wronged Kulpa based on the strike three call that ended the top of the third inning. And although Ketel Marte kept his composure to rebound for a home run after the strike two call in his fourth-inning at-bat came on a pitch well below the zone, it was jarring to see an umpire call a vertical zone that encompassed both pitches within his strike zone.

In a bit of irony, the Cardinals ultimately came about the game-tying run later in the game on a bases-loaded walk when Herrera held off on another 3-2 pitch.

This time, Kulpa agreed that the pitch was low.