Very interesting, and yet not too surprising. If you're getting more strikes called, a pitcher will throw less pitches...

My concerns with pitch framing...

1.) I think it would be interesting to see how the numbers would look if you removed 3-0 and 0-2 counts. 3-0, if it's pretty close, it's a strike. If it's 0-2, that same pitch in the same location is often called a ball.

2.) As much as we want to think that all players have the same strike zone, does it not make sense that someone catching Sam Deduno, Kyle Gibson, Ryan Pressly, other rookies and unproven pitchers will have different strike zones than proven pitchers? It's human nature. I bet Greg Maddux's catchers in his prime had pretty good pitch framing numbers if they had had such things then.

3.) Game situations shouldn't, but likely do, play into it.

I have lots of concerns about pitch framing as a metric as well:

- it has to be normalized per umpire (it is not.) And we now that a 5'7" 300lbs umpire's strike zone is different than a 6'7" 200 lbs umpire's.

- it has to be normalized per pitcher (it is not). I bet if Greg Maddux was throwing exclusively to Ryan Doumit, Doumit would have been the best pitch framing catcher in the game...

Until they find a way to normalize their data in at least those 2 dimensions, I am not buying it...

If that is the definition, it is suspect. In theory, it is just as important for a catcher to get the strikes his pitcher deserves as getting balls called strikes.