What to tell a pitcher when blue has a shoe box size zone

[parttimecatcher]

Last game DD pitched in HP ump was really squeezing, I was behind the backstop and clearly watched 3 drops at the knees, a change up at the bottom of the letters and numerous pitches on the corners called balls. So the adjustment DD made was to trow them more down the middle closer to belt high. Guess what happened, yep bombs away. What do you tell her to do? Coaches where telling her not to pitch down the middle but if she didnt it would have been a walk fest. My best advice for her was to adapt to the zone being called and if that meant she got hit at least there was the defense to hopefully get the out. Cant get an out by walking everyone.

Thanks

PTC

 

[Sweet Lou]

Yell at her - "Just Throw Strikes!" (I'm kidding)

Tough call. Have to live with blue's zone but if it is really small, yeah you might get hit if you have come right in the middle of the zone. If she's not getting the high or low call, first try working the edges and see if she's getting in or out call.

 

[Bucketmom]

Looking forward to see replies on this thread. There have been a few occasions where I've had to tell DD just ignore the UMP and throw.

 

[humpty]

Hit that dime. Haha. Cater to the Ump or walk batters. Get ahead then try to get the batters to Chase.

 

[halskinner]

Did the blue have the same small strike zone for the other team as well?

Throw at the strike zone and have the movement happen late. If she can do that, get them to swing at air or make lousy contact..

 

[starsnuffer]

Walk them and throw them out at second.

-W

 

[David Carter]

As long as your hitters get the same chance to bomb away can't really complain.

I would keep trying though there is usually one pet place every umpire has that they like to be generous. Not anything against umpires just usually has to do with the way they set up and what their eye sight and depth perception is you just have to find it.

 

[GOINGDEEP]

For us we looked at it in couple of ways. One, sometimes changing a pitcher can change the zone......I've seen this happen many times. Two, if you got to throw over the plate..........do so but put more emphasis on mixing speeds, at least you can keep the batter off balance. Three, ( had a game where blue had a zone the size of a grape ) pitch to your defensive strengths. Our left side was much stronger than the right, so we threw mostly inside RHB, outside LHB hoping to force the ball in play that direction.

 

[mosftballdad]

We try to tell our pitchers to move the ball by half ball increments (hard to do) and fine the strike zone, live there for a moment and then make half ball adjusments back out and see if the ump will follow you. Accuracy is key here. Had an ump squeezing us and our pitcher was able to make the adjusment and blue followed her back out and was soon getting the edge of the plate.

 

[coach james]

I think we had the same HP blue last night... if her pitches weren't on the belt, right down the middle he called it a ball...
Hard for her to stay focused when she felt shafted... He was clearly a home town guy, and was trying to cater to the home team.