strike zone

[ToGreySt]

When I was getting patched to work high school ball, my trainers had me work on a pitching machine and taped my work. Their initial reaction about me was my zone was too small, they took me aside and said that I can give them an extra ball's width on the inside and two on the outside, both of those conform to what they called the "high school" strike. my question is this, if your zone gets widened for high school and lower levels (mine sure does), at what level do you use the strict interpretation of the zone? do you wait till college ball? or high school playoffs?

Joe

[BigUmp56]

I think your evaluators are way to liberal in their interpretation of the strike zone. Two balls widths off of the outside corner is quite an expansive zone. 1 balls width to either side is how we preferr to define our HS zone.


Tim.

[Dave Hensley]

Originally Posted by ToGreySt

When I was getting patched to work high school ball, my trainers had me work on a pitching machine and taped my work. Their initial reaction about me was my zone was too small, they took me aside and said that I can give them an extra ball's width on the inside and two on the outside, both of those conform to what they called the "high school" strike. my question is this, if your zone gets widened for high school and lower levels (mine sure does), at what level do you use the strict interpretation of the zone? do you wait till college ball? or high school playoffs?

Joe

I don't know and I don't care if I'm giving 1/2, 1, 1 and 1/2, or 2 "ball-widths" off the corner. The key is that the pitch looks like a strike, and the most important ingredient in that formula is the catcher. If he sets up reasonably and the pitch hits the spot and he sticks it, it's a strike. If he has to reach, lunge, pull, frame, or otherwise butcher the pitch, it ain't.

Seems to work for me.

[PeteBooth]

Originally Posted by ToGreySt

When I was getting patched to work high school ball, my trainers had me work on a pitching machine and taped my work. Their initial reaction about me was my zone was too small, they took me aside and said that I can give them an extra ball's width on the inside and two on the outside, both of those conform to what they called the "high school" strike. my question is this, if your zone gets widened for high school and lower levels (mine sure does), at what level do you use the strict interpretation of the zone? do you wait till college ball? or high school playoffs?

Joe

Forget about the book definition of the strike zone.

The game is for the participants, therefore, the strike zone is defined as that which is accepted by the leagues we service.

Therefore, it seems as though your instructors were defining the zone on how that particular HS association wants it called.

Also, IMO, you do not have to differentiate ball widths whether inside / ouside because of the metal bats. Even if a player gets jammed, you often see those hits we refer to as "the metal bat" hit which if wood were used, the bat would probably crack and a weak groundout or pop-up. Therefore, I give the same width on both sides when metal bats are used.

With the exception of high calibur ball my suggestion is to have a "liberal" zone meaning there's not too much you as a PU can do if the pitch is too high or too low but you can expand the zone. Make the batters swing and you will find that the game has a better flow to it.

Also, with the exception of PRO ball most leagues do not like a "postage" for a zone.

Pete Booth

[socalblue1]

Originally Posted by ToGreySt

When I was getting patched to work high school ball, my trainers had me work on a pitching machine and taped my work. Their initial reaction about me was my zone was too small, they took me aside and said that I can give them an extra ball's width on the inside and two on the outside, both of those conform to what they called the "high school" strike. my question is this, if your zone gets widened for high school and lower levels (mine sure does), at what level do you use the strict interpretation of the zone? do you wait till college ball? or high school playoffs?

Joe

For HS Frosh this would be OK. One ball width for JV & Varsity. In other words, call as wide a zone as is reasonable without getting flack.

[nickrego]

My association for HS goes 1/2 ball to the inside, and 1 ball to the outside.

I am quite comfortable with that. If you give them too much to the inside, batters start getting hit. If you try to go to much to the outside, you lose consistency, because you are getting too far from your point of reference (and they stop looking like strikes).

I hope some upper level guys answer your question about when do you stop expanding the zone. It looks like they don't in MLB, but what about between MLB and HS ?

[mcrowder]

I would find your zone and stick with it, regardless of how high up you get. The zone described here to you is reasonable at all shaving levels.

I used to be a "Call the book zone" guy too ... but the real reason the zone hasn't changed in the book when it has changed in reality is that it takes an act of congress to change a word in the book, and reality works better than the book zone in practice.

I would note to all who said that this guy's mentors were telling him to go too far wide that they may have been overcompensating. perhaps after watching him on tape, they saw he was not calling strikes up to an entire ball over the plate - telling him to go 2 more balls to the outside may not have meant from the plate per se, but rather from where he THOUGHT the plate was based on what they were seeing from him on tape.

[shickenbottom]

I tend to agree with Dave, you can call the pitch most of the time, (60 to 75%), based upon how the catcher - catches the ball. The obvious deviation is the looping curveball, and the slider. Timing helps tremendously, slow down then slow down some more. Watch the ball to the glove, hear the pop, try to read the mfg label on the glove, you know the R, W, or whatever, then call the pitch.

Build your zone based upon the "hittable pitch". I use distinguishable landmarks that exist on the field and every batter. A couple inches inside (my nose in the slot), the catchers knees set the low end (in the squat, they are roughly 3 to 5 inches below the batters knees and he's roughly 2 to 3' behind the batter - I can't calculate the physics of how much a ball drops going at a particular speed over a specific distance, but it works), just under the batters elbows in a normal stance (this is also my eye level for the upper end of the zone), and extend accross. Imagine a vertical line for the outside corner that is equal to the inside corner and voila.

For wood bat games I'll adjust my inside corner to the edge of the plate and keep everything else. This is usually accomplished by moving over in the slot just a bit.

[David B]

Originally Posted by Dave Hensley

I don't know and I don't care if I'm giving 1/2, 1, 1 and 1/2, or 2 "ball-widths" off the corner. The key is that the pitch looks like a strike, and the most important ingredient in that formula is the catcher. If he sets up reasonably and the pitch hits the spot and he sticks it, it's a strike. If he has to reach, lunge, pull, frame, or otherwise butcher the pitch, it ain't.

Seems to work for me.

This is a great post for all umpires. Trying to say I give a 1/2 a ball inside and a 1 and 1/2 on the outside is simply unobtainable.

The majority of the pitches that are questionable are generally going to be called based on the F2 does with the pitch.

Well, except for "small ball" where we'll take any strike we can get.

Thanks
David