Eric Haase on the Digitization of a Human Game, in Ways Good, Bad, and Just Different

It's not lost on Eric Haase that his human presence—the little conversations, the politicking, the control over the pace and the tenor of the action around home plate—is a big part of why he's already enjoyed a substantial career in the major leagues.

"It’s kind of hard, especially with some of these older umpires that I’m used to working with, have really good relationships with," Haase said Monday, in the Brewers' clubhouse at Maryvale, reflecting on the impact of a system that will (probably) soon bend the strike zone to the whims of computers and cameras, rather than umpires and catchers. "I get talking to them a lot behind the plate. It’s really hard for them to—you learn the strike zone when you’re coming up, and it’s part of the game. That’s kind of why guys like me have been able to survive."

You probably won't be surprised, then, to hear that Haase is not excited about that prospect. However, he's not merely speaking out of self-interest. After spending chunks of the last two seasons in Triple A, he has specific qualms with the setup.

"I’m not a fan. I think that we’re just getting a little too in the weeds," Haase said. "This is a game played by humans, judged by humans. I like the implementation of tech, as far as getting better and increasing the human aspect of it, but I think we’re getting a little too in the weeds. I got a chance to do it last year in Triple A. Quite a few issues with it. There’s a lot of calibration issues. It seems to be a little bit different everywhere you go. And I don’t know if that has to do with different stadiums, or where it’s placed or whatnot, but if we’re going to go to something like that, I’d like to see it a little more consistent."

Catchers know perfectly well that the strike zone umpires call is imperfect. The imperfections feel patterned, though, and predictable. Haase (and the teams he's worked for, including and especially the Brewers) can pinpoint the places where specific umpires can be massaged into an extra strike or two, and where it's not worth it. He even knows who will be open to hearing feedback, and who won't. The variance in a system that is designed not to have any feels more random, less manipulable, and thus crueler.

"You have certain guys behind the plate, and you’re like, ‘Ok, this is his zone. You might not get here, but you might be able to go here.’ So there’s a lot of nuance to that," Haase put it. "It takes a long time to figure those things out. That’s not the case when it’s, ‘Did it go through this imaginary square on the plate?’ It’s just a little bit different from an overall game perspective."

Still, home plate is a solid thing, with a constant width. Whether the interested parties feel it's so or not, the computerized zone has an easy way to ensure accuracy when it comes to what's inside, what's outside, and what's over the dish. Vertically, though, the strike zone has always been (practically, if not literally) a subjective thing—a negotiated thing, with everyone involved fighting to tug the boundaries one direction of the other and the umpire doing their best to estimate the right line in empty space, accounting subjectively for crouches, differing body proportions, and unique planes of movement as the ball reaches the plate. It's up and down that we've seen real changes to the shape of the zone since it's begun to be automated, and Haase doesn't feel the new, arbitrary lines even meet the most important standard: consistency.

"Top and bottom’s definitely different," he said. "Obviously, they take our measurements and whatnot, so it’s supposed to be different guy to guy, but I just don’t see the system being that good, able to change it guy to guy, that fast. So, like I said, calibration I think is a little bit of an issue. And even at the same time, it kind of goes back to, ‘Today we’ve got so-and-so behind the plate, the low zone’s there, but the high zone’s not.’ Or vice-versa. At least you know, ‘Ok, today this is a strike, or today it’s not.’ If you don’t feel like something’s a strike, but it says it’s clipping the thing, we really have no way of, not arguing with the umpire, but saying our piece."

There will still be value in good receiving, if and when the new system comes to regular-season big-league games. Catchers who frame pitches well can still enlarge the strike zone at its corners, and force hitters who feel wronged to risk losing one of their team's precious challenges for the day if they're wrong. Nor has Haase been depending merely on talking his way into more strikes, all these years. Still, it's clear that some of the players closest to the new system feel frustrated by it, for reasons both practical and philosophical.

Of course, the automation of the zone is not the only way in which technology has become a prominent part of the art of catching. PitchCom is still relatively new, but Haase (like many other catchers) already has much more experience with that system than with the ABS challenges. He's not against it—he readily acknowledges the necessity of the system, given the way teams were using still other technology to steal signs before it came along—but Haase feels significant ways in which PitchCom (along with the pitch timer) has changed the process. It's not just that he types pitches in with his fingers, instead of using them for traditional signaling. Having the device sometimes changes which pitches he calls.

"Oh, for sure. I mean, it changes the game drastically," he said. "Obviously, with the pitch clock, if you give one sign the guy doesn’t want, ok, shake, put in another one. But if he shakes that one, now you only have a couple of seconds. So you’re either going to fingers, or you’re putting in something that you don’t really believe in. That can get a little hairy."

Because coded digital language can be a bit more stilted than bodily signals, and because there's so little time between pitches, Haase acknowledged that it's more important to be on the same page as his pitchers. Playing the game at its new pace and utilizing its new technology demands a new level of preparedness, even as the league's standard for preparedness gets higher all the time.

However dubious he might be of some of the changes, Haase is rolling with them. He understands that these decisions are above his paygrade. One thing he won't change, however, is the way he attacks his job, even though he enters this spring as a much more comfortable, established backup catcher, rather than one ticketed (in all likelihood) for Triple-A Nashville, as he was last year.

"It’s the exact same. I’ll do the same exact thing as I did last spring training," he said. "Just trying to get better. And that might be something I can offer to a young pitcher in a game that I didn’t even play in. There’s always little bits of value that I can either learn from or try to help some of the younger guys [find]. So I don’t really care if they told me I was going to Nashville tomorrow or breaking with the team. I’m just trying to do what I have to do here."

While there are a good 15 or 20 players who will provide more objective, individual, on-field value to the Brewers than Haase will this season, his insights on the ways that the game is starting to circumscribe human interactions serve as a good reminder of the ones he still offers. His dedication to being a teammate and to improving teamwork in all phases is still the source of Haase's value, even if he has to create that value in new ways.