There was a time during his long career as a distinguished catcher that the first scouting report Mike Matheny wanted as he prepared for a game wasn’t for his pitcher or the opposing batters, but that day’s umpire.
“There were certain umpires that we knew would stretch the zone away,” Matheny said. “When I was catching that’s one of the first things we asked. What do we have to deal with here? If we had a lefty and I knew we had a wide (strike zone) guy then you could walk a guy off the plate. That was a 1-hour, 45-minute game ahead of us, most likely.