The pitch skims by the plate an inch or so off the black. The catcher never moved his glove. It was outside. If he had been one of my regular catchers, he would have known I call such a pitch a strike in a heartbeat. Still, no harm done, I thought.
All trainers believe that every umpire can nail the pitch that splits the plate belt high.
My experience shows that the more an umpire knows about plate mechanics, the more likely he is to miss a strike. That s why I counsel umpires to call marginal pitches strikes rather than balls. For a gross error occurs when the UIC begins to squeeze the strike zone. Every experienced umpire knows it happens and when. For the first few innings, the umpire is loose, relaxed, fresh.