Big strike zone
Tech is a good team. The home plate umpire today was simply pathetic. He was calling strikes 8-12 inches off the plate all day. I can’t believe Coach Van Horn didn’t come unglued and get tossed.
I am not saying we should have won. I am just stating a fact.
That strike zone, even if called the same way against both teams, unfairly helps the lesser team. At least that’s how it appears to me. No hitter can be expected to swing at bad pitches. Good hitters, even if they recognize a wider strike zone, won’t swing at a “bad” pitch that should be called a ball. Even if he does, he’s likely to miss.
A good pitcher, even if he knows it’s a wide zone might not want to go so far out to walk batters. Their pitcher was lights out throwing the ball way off the plate, but ours only allowed 2 runs. One inning was completed by both pitchers throwing something like 11 pitches. Six outs on 11 pitches. Incredible.
It seems to me just a zone operates as an equalizer. The skill differences are reduced to accommodate a different game.
Some of you who understand baseball better than I do might disabuse me of this idea, but I can’t help but think a more normal strike zone would have worked to our benefit.
If the ump is consistently calling strikes six inches off the outside corner then hitters have to start swinging at them. I never did get the video feed to work so I listened to Phil; couldn’t determine from his call what the strike zone was.
There was a lot of generosity for any pitch 4-6 inches off the plate to the pitchers’ left, so it was a tough day for left-handed hitters who were pitched inside or for right-handed hitters who were pitched away from. It seemed like there were a lot of left handers who took strike three, and some right handers had to expand their zone to swing at pitches they wouldn’t have otherwise.
I don’t really think the strike zone benefitted one team over the other. Both teams can hit the ball well if it is thrown over the plate. None of the pitchers had to throw it over the plate. Arkansas’ pitchers got some favorable strikes called, too.
Well Robert Moore took a pitch inside for a call strike 3! That makes me wonder if the umpire actually called it 6 inches inside too! Don’t take the bat out of a hitters hands.
I do understand hitters need to be swinging at anything close with 2 strokes. The wind probably impacted the outcome of the game as much as the expanded strike zone. There were a few balls crushed that would have normally left the yard.
You’re probably right, but I compared it in my mind to a football game on a slippery field. Both teams play on it, but if one team is much faster than the other, it seems to benefit the team that doesn’t have to rely as heavily on speed or agility. That’s probably not a good comparison–but if a ball is so far out of the strike zone that it can’t be hit or hit well, it seems to me a team with more power & better batters are brought down to the level of the lesser team. But it was only a thought. Not something I’d put much reliance on.
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