Strike Zone

ARE YA'LL KIDDING !!!!.........

......just because the strike zone is called different in college than in HS/TB it all of a sudden becomes a hitters game? All of you guys are way smarter than that! The pitcher in Fpitch is still in control of the game period. First it was, oh my God, we've got to limit the pop of the bat, ban this one, then ban that one. Now its the strike zone is too small.........hey I'm in this game with all of ya'll, both batting and pitching. I certainly want my teams pitchers to rock. And I want my teams batters to rock. The game has not changed the hitters way any more or less than it has gone toward the pitcher. I DO see exactly where cfast is going here and I only use his/her post to get my point across. ....I know....what point?....this point.......just because "it" was done one way before, and now "it" has changed, deal with it. Get better, be the best that you can. The strike zone is an intangible object, it will change with each and every ump. The CLASS ACT pitchers in NC can hold their own regardless of how the ump calls it. ......OK, I'll be honest with my friends here.......the batters need a break!!!!!! Marlin, the fence sitter.

 

5 million times I've said keep it down. The problem is when you don't get the call. Dukedog is exactly right. I guess a pitcher could survive in the middle if it's low, but if they're forced to go to the middle and to the wheelhouse.....could get nasty quick.

 

Except for one team of umpires, we were blessed with quality umpires and most just did their job and when un noticed. We had one group that was terrible for both sides!

Now strike zone: Inside pitch that was waist and below was a strike with majority! Pitch on outside corner was not given very often but curve ball breaking over the edge of plate was given strike. I forced our girls to be aggressive so we averaged one SO a game and about same in walks. Strike zone was fairly small and my young pitchers struggled till they figured out where the zone was acceptable. Even with small zone, we could figure out what worked.

Great tournament, tons of college coaches, we had 25 at our first game Saturday and 12 at first game Thursday. Smallest crowd was 6:20 game with 6. For doubters, we wrote down every school as we handed out profiles. D-1 were after 2010 and 2011 mainly but 2009's got good looks and several coaches were asking me for 2008!

 

Dead on perfect post....

.....concerning the strike zone calls. The waist high inside hand cuffer was a killer! My dd k'd looking at that pitch. Also, the breaking ball nipping the plate out front gave batters hell for called strikes. These kids are smart and know to move up in the box if a pitcher is breaking ks off the corner. I think that the "zone" this weekend was ok. If a pitcher was in control of where she wanted the ball to go, then she rocked. If a batter did not recognize the tendancies of the umps zone and took an inside, "in the up/down column" pitch, she walked back to the dugout. I love it. Raise the bar.

 

If I'm not mistaken, NCAA did actually change their definition of the top of the strike zone this year to lower it from the front armpit to the bottom of the sternum. I've seen speculation that this is to limit the effectiveness of the rise ball.

Almost all of umpires are going to call a strike if any part of the ball crosses, at the correct height, any part of the plate (and many consider the black edge fully part of the plate) at any point of the pitch. So yes, when that curve catches just a corner, or that slow change up falls into the zone over the back of the plate, it will usually (and should) be called a strike. A large number of blues call a strike zone that is a bit wider near the belt than it is up at the hands or near the knees, sometimes a ball width or so more.

That said, an umpire who's "not giving you the corners," may in fact be giving you the corners, but it also giving you a break when you "miss" a bit higher.

 

I got this from a college ump...

When I asked him about the college strike zone, inside / outside specifically, he told me that they called what was known as "The River" which is the 6" distance between the inside batters box lines and the plate. He said that the ball is 4" wide and if the ball was between the plate and the line of the batters box, in or out, they usually called it a strike as long as it was the right height.

He also said that not every box is marked correctly, some lines are closer than 6" to the plate, so sometimes when they called a strike that appeared to be on the line or in the batter's box it was really within the 6" distance. I guess that you could say that the strike zone will always be up for interpretation by whoever is behind the plate!

 

Agreed