PALM HARBOR, Fla. (AP) – Longtime major league umpire Frank Pulli, who used instant replay to make a call nearly a decade before video reviews were allowed, has died. He was 78.
Major League Baseball said Pulli died Wednesday in Palm Harbor, Fla., from complications of Parkinson’s disease.
Pulli umpired in the National League from 1972-99 and worked four World Series, six NL championship series and two All-Star games.
Pulli was among the 22 umpires who lost their jobs in a failed mass resignation. He was an MLB supervisor from 2000-07.
Early in the 1999 season, Pulli checked replays on a TV camera near the Marlins’ dugout and then overturned his own home run call, instead giving Cliff Floyd a double. Baseball officials later said Pulli incorrectly used replay.
In 2008, MLB approved the use of replay on potential home runs.
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