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Jones: Is ESPN's K-Zone too much technology?

 
Published April 2, 2015

Familiar with ESPN's K-Zone? It's the little box that appears over home plate that shows whether a pitch was a ball or a strike during a game. Usually, the K-Zone is used strictly on replays. But this season, look for ESPN to use it during live action for most pitches. That's what ESPN producer Phil Orlins told Sports Business Daily.

Ugh. Not sure I like this idea. I don't even like TBS's use of the strike-zone box and that's limited to the corner of the television screen. The ESPN K-Zone will be a box over the middle of the plate. Sounds like it could be a distraction. Then again, most of us thought the boxes in the corner of the screen telling viewers the score and the count and the inning and number of outs used to be a distraction and now we can't imagine watching even one pitch without it.