re: Whoever started coaching catchers on 1 knee

Do a film review and you'll see that the number of times a guy has to block a ball from a knee is far less than the number of times a catcher has to steal a strike at the bottom of the zone., and for the record, athletic guys can still move and block balls effectively.

Need receipts..? Well in 2017 and 18 , pitches taken by hitters in "borderline area", the strike rate was 35.2% and 35.5%. After adopting the knee down approach, in 2019, that number jumped to 43.6%, and in 2020, it was 45.2%.

In in 2022, the number of passed balls and wild pitches fell off a cliff. From 6.9 per 1000 pitches to 5.7 per 1000. Comparing a 10% gain in called strikes to a 0.7% passed ball rate, a reasonable person can see the gain here and deal with the occasional mishap. Conveniently, this is about the time nearly all MLB programs implemented the one knee set up. Also around this time, they moved to the electronic pitch sign delivery, so you get fewer cross ups.

One can't empirically say with certainty that the one knee set up is solely responsible, but YOU have to deal with the fact that the game is changing, and you have to accept it.

Anyone with youngsters playing the game, if you're not training them to the latest, age appropriate techniques, you're doing them a disservice.