There is something magical about the relationship between a professional baseball pitcher and catcher.
If you don’t know this, the duo just looks like one player throwing a white ball to another player squatting in futuristic gear to catch it.
But if you have ever played the game or enjoy watching baseball on television, you know single-handedly what is really happening:
Art is being created and perfected.
It’s strategic. It’s subtle. And it’s fast.
For decades, the art of pitching and catching has remained one of the most human parts of Major League Baseball.
You might be familiar with duos like Tarik Skubal (Pitcher) and Jake Rogers (Catcher) from the Detroit Tigers or Shohei Ohtani (Pitcher) and Dalton Rushing (Catcher) for the Los Angeles Dodgers.
But in 2026, this art form is being interrupted by robots.
Major League Baseball is entering a unique era with the recent introduction of the Automated Ball-Strike System (ABS), commonly referred to as the “robot umpire”. What used to be decided solely by human eyes is now at risk and determined by technology. While the MLB promises change via accuracy and fairness, it raises a bigger question: will the art of pitching and catching change when a machine takes over the call?
Dynamic Duo: A zoom into a catcher’s role
Pitching and catching are very important to the game of baseball. A pitcher’s battery partner and overall, an extension of the professional franchise coaching staff, catchers have a primary responsibility to build strong communication and trust that sticks for a lifetime.
The catcher’s ability to stay in sync with their tempo is critical to the game. A steady ball transfer back to the pitcher to keep the pace of the game — not too fast nor too slow. This rhythm allows pitchers and catchers to find their dynamic groove and perform at a higher level in the MLB.
Catching is more than the receiver of the ball. A great one is the captain of the game, the strategist, and the hype man for the pitcher. Catchers who have the superpower to read their pitchers’ strengths and tendencies will maintain that authoritative relationship.
In order to gain this form of rapport, a catcher has to remember:
- Pitch sequencing patterns
- Controlling ideal game tempo
- Perfecting the ideal target location
- Nailing that one pitch that becomes impossible to hit
A catcher is supposed to ensure that pitchers can attack the zone rather than having jitters about ball placement.
Most importantly, the secret to the relationship between the pitcher and catcher is consistent trust.
The lost art of framing
Framing a pitch is one of the biggest parts of the catcher position.
In short, framing is the ability of a catcher to receive a pitch to create an illusion of a ball to look like a strike to the umpire, even if it reaches away from the zone.
It’s very nonchalant.
As viewers, you can barely tell that the catchers are doing it.
And honestly, that is the true beauty of it.
At the professional level in Major League Baseball, elite catchers (for example, Patrick Bailey from the San Francisco Giants or Cal Raleigh from the Seattle Mariners) have built their careers on this particular skill since they know the strike zone very well. A really good frame of a sucky pitch can turn a batter’s count upside down, which has the ability to completely shift the advantage from the batter to the pitcher.
Over the course of the season, this impact can add up significantly.
However, framing can only continue being a superpower if umpires remain strictly human. The ABS system tracks the ball and uses T-Mobile’s technology to determine its location and whether it touches the strike zone.
Which means the vulnerable art of framing risks becoming less relevant.
so what exactly is the abs system?
Moving into the 2026 season, both hitters and pitchers are stepping into a different kind of strike zone.
MLB has officially approved the Automated Ball Strike System (ABS) for use during the regular season, postseason, and Spring Training games, starting with the 2026 season.
Human umpires will still have the opportunity to call balls and strikes, but pitchers, catchers, and hitters will be able to fully challenge those calls, with a tracking system making the final ruling.
This sounds like a crazy MLB tech headline, but when it comes to being on the field, it’s going to slowly reshape the way that at-bats are played and how pitchers can attack hitters.
The zone is standardized and set in the vertical plane over the 17-inch plate, with the top and bottom defined as percentages of each hitter’s height, approximately 27% to 53.5%.
T-Mobile is powering the system with its 5G network for in-stadium operations and unique fan experiences. This partnership began during the 2025 Spring Training and will expand throughout the 2026 MLB season. The 5G network will enable instant tracking and review of ball/strike calls, making T-Mobile central to the game’s innovation and overall fan engagement.
Deal or No Deal?
ABS sounds like the best thing to happen to the MLB, where some even might say since the addition of the pitching clock.
Baseball is a sport obsessed with stats (whether that’s batting averages, ERAs, or even OPS) and with a consistent strike zone that aligns with this analytical approach. It creates a sense of fairness for franchises and their players.
Baseball is also about the feel of the game. The human element of the game is crucial. Pitchers were forced to learn about how to work within an umpire’s zone, where catchers learned how to trust their gut on calls.
With ABS… this dynamic might slowly begin to fade.
The strike zone is now fixed and very objective. While that might be far, it actually removes a layer of artistry that has defined the MLB for long-term generations.
a catchers perspective
As someone who has worn catcher’s gear for about fifteen plus years, this shift feels especially significant to the game. Catching has always been more about being able to hold a squat for almost two hours. It’s about learning to understand your pitcher and the methods of the game on a deeper level. As well as controlling the tempo of the game, managing the pressure stemming from the pitcher, and learning how to squeeze your wrist tight to get your pitcher in and out of innings QUICKLY.
One of the best traits that catching taught me is how to work with an eight-man team while also multitasking under pressure. From a college perspective today, this is the main reason I can balance three major classes and four big on-campus internships.
As a young girl in the early 2010s, I was bullied into playing catcher because male coaches (growing up) thought I was either not good enough to play a main base or just “skin and bones”.
It was a challenging reward.
I had a relatively good arm. I was always brave and threw my body everywhere as hard as I could. I felt like I had something to prove to my community, especially since I played softball for my Dad (since he could not afford to play baseball growing up in the 1980s).
I never once stopped smiling while practicing, conditioning, or playing in games because I had my Dad to play for.
By the end of my career, I was playing both community college and high school ball, and I was offered three collegiate softball scholarships in my senior year of high school, largely because of my abilities and, more importantly, my positive attitude.
But I forced myself to say goodbye because I could not endure the bullying anymore on the mental side.
However, the evolution of one’s identity is just as important, just like in the game of baseball.
Evolutions within relationships are nothing new
Baseball is always evolving, and the game is forced to adapt.
The art of pitching and catching is now about maintaining a hybrid system between human abilities and robotic systems in 2026.
The art will remain. It will just look a little different.