Strike Zone

[greymule]

Just to clarify, I don't believe in calling truly bad pitches strikes, whatever the situation. If the pitcher throws 50 in a row that are over the batter's head or in the dirt, that's 50 balls.

This isn't just a theoretical point. A few years ago, I began a SP (men's) softball game with 48 straight balls. (Boy, was that game fun to work.)

Once on a business trip (to a Chicago suburb) I found a LL game near my hotel, so I sat in the stands for a while. The first 30 pitches would have been balls if the plate had been 6 feet wide and the batter 10 feet tall. And the 30 took about 20 minutes, as after each pitch the catcher waddled over to retrieve the ball from wherever it had ended up. When they decided to station a coach at the backstop to do the retrieving and "speed" the game along, I left.