Home Plate Umpire does make a difference

[PeteBooth]

Don't know how many of you watched last night Yanks / A's game but here is my opinion on certain aspects of it.

In the first 3 innings there was a total of 9 runs (out of a total of 12) scored. Why? IMO Rick Reed's strike zone.
The commentators (and this time I happened to agree with them) noticed that Home Plate Umpire Rick Reed (not the Met pitcher) was not calling that below the knee strike for either pitcher.

Then in about the 4th or 5th inning (can't remember) Rick Reed punched out Scott Brosius of the Ynaks on a below the knee pitch (one that he had been calling a ball for the previous 3 or 4 innings). Brosius looked surprised and even the commentators made mention of this.

From then on home plate umpire Rick Reed started calling that below the knee pitch for both teams and as a result, there were only a total of 3 more runs scored the rest of the way.

Don't know if Reed was conscience of this or not.

The point of my thread is that the Home Plate umpire "sets the tone of the game" Im most instances (unless a team is just "on fire") a high scoring game means that the strike zone that day was a "postage" compared to a low scoring game in which the PU made the players swing the bat.

Referee magazine has a really good article this month on the strike zone. In the article the author mentions that the PU should call those border line pitches and get the hitters to swing the bat. The game moves along a lot quicker.

If a PRO ball player doesn't have to worry about certain parts of the zone - they really tee off.


Pete Booth