ABOVE AVERAGE IS OVER:

There's no perfect umpire and that's bad for the game. MLB defines the strike zone as, "the area over home plate from the midpoint between a batter's shoulders and the top of the uniform pants--when the batter is in his stance and prepared to swing at a pitched ball--and a point just below the kneecap."

MLB needs this to be a matter of right and wrong, not someone's opinion or a human being who'll make mistakes. A lot of baseball fans know who Angel Hernandez is, for example, and that's because he's a terrible umpire. Why should his poor decision-making impact the outcomes of games? A team deserves to win if they do everything right. However, someone like Hernandez making mistakes jeopardizes that success. We shouldn't dismiss umpire's miscues as part of the game.

Hernandez aside, there are other umpire problems. Different umpires call different strike zones. That's why we see pitchers talking to umpires between innings about certain pitches. They want to know how the umpire sees the pitch because it varies from umpire to umpire. That's stupid. This isn't a matter of opinion.

Additionally, umpires tend to give veteran players more leeway. Younger pitchers get a slightly less favorable strike zone from umpires while it's slightly more favorable for veteran pitchers. Those who watched former New York Yankees closer and Hall of Famer Mariano Rivera pitch have probably witnessed this phenomenon before. He got a wider strike zone than most, as data confirms.

Others argue that umpires are racist and that white umpires give more favorable calls to white pitchers than blacks and Hispanics.

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