Major League Baseball took a decisive step today to rein in the use of artificial intelligence and third-party software in the dugout, blocking access to a custom tab on team-issued iPads that had allowed clubs to load their own applications during games. The restriction took effect on the first day of the second half of the 2024 season, marking a deliberate boundary in the sport’s ongoing negotiation with technology. The dugout iPads at the center of the change are Apple tablets running a secure operating system.
They give coaches and players access to live and archived video feeds from MLB’s camera network, as well as league-provided statistical data including pitch tracking and batted ball metrics. The devices themselves remain in use; what has changed is that teams can no longer load their own software onto them through the custom tab during games.
The league-provided video and statistical functions continue to be available.
The custom tab’s role
According to a June 11, 2024 memo from MLB executive vice president Morgan Sword, the custom tab was a software feature that enabled teams to run applications providing recommendations on substitutions, pitch calling, and other in-game decisions. This capability raised questions about how much technological assistance should be permissible during a game traditionally governed by human judgment. The memo from Sword made explicit that the custom tab was the mechanism through which teams could run applications offering strategic recommendations.
By disabling that tab, MLB has drawn a clear line between permissible technology and what the league considers an unfair competitive advantage. For now, dugout iPads will function as they did before teams began loading proprietary analytics and AI tools onto them.
The league has not indicated whether this restriction is temporary or permanent, but the timing — the start of the second half of the season — suggests a deliberate reset.
Technology’s evolving place in baseball
Baseball’s relationship with technology stretches back to the late 19th century, when the sport first embraced professionalism and standardized its rules. By the early 20th century, the National League and the American League had formed under the National Agreement of 1903, creating a unified structure that still governs the game today. Over the decades, innovations from radio broadcasts to televised games reshaped how fans experienced baseball, while inside the ballpark, managers relied on scouting reports, stopwatches, and later, rudimentary statistical tools to guide decisions.
The introduction of the iPad in 2010 marked another leap, turning a portable touchscreen device into a coach’s pocket-sized command center. Apple’s tablet, with its intuitive interface and growing processing power, quickly became a fixture in dugouts, offering real-time video review and data once reserved for front offices.
At its core, the dugout iPad is a controlled computing device that gives teams access to league-provided feeds and metrics during games. The debate over technology’s role in baseball is as old as the sport’s professional era. From the introduction of scorecards to the adoption of radar guns and pitch-tracking cameras, each advance has prompted questions about fairness and tradition. Today’s restriction on AI and third-party software in-game reflects a familiar tension: how to preserve the human element of strategy while acknowledging that data and computation now shape every pitch.
For coaches and players, the change means returning to a narrower set of tools — one that stops short of algorithmic recommendations but still delivers league-sanctioned video and statistics. The decision does not eliminate analytics; it curbs their real-time deployment in a way that may affect minute-to-minute decisions.
For fans watching at home or in the stands, the shift is largely invisible — iPads still display pitch tracking and video. But for teams accustomed to pushing the limits of what software can suggest, the change forces a return to older rhythms of judgment and instinct. In a league where every advantage is scrutinized, the line between data and decision-making has been redrawn once again.
