Motivation Quote by Cal Hubbard

An umpire admitting fallibility is either refreshing honesty or a small act of gamesmanship; Cal Hubbard’s line manages to be both. “Boys” sets the clubhouse tone: this is insider talk, not a press-conference sermon. Then comes the disarming confession - “misses ’em every once in a while” - which lowers the temperature and signals he’s not posturing as an infallible authority. But the pivot is the real point: “so if it’s close, you’d better hit it.” The humor works because it sneaks a warning inside a shrug.

The intent is practical crowd control. Players love to argue judgment calls because “close” is where narrative and ego live. Hubbard reframes the dispute: if you’re gambling on a borderline pitch, you’re choosing to put your fate in a human being’s eyes, angle, and split-second timing. His subtext is blunt accountability: don’t treat the strike zone like a courtroom where you can litigate technicalities; treat it like weather. Adjust.

Context matters, too. Hubbard came out of a sports world before replay, before pitch tracking, before “accountability” meant a tweetstorm and a graphic overlay. Umpires then weren’t just adjudicators; they were part of the game’s muscle memory, keeping pace, discouraging chaos, maintaining authority without sounding like a tyrant. The line is a neat bit of psychological umpiring: admit you’re human, then dare hitters to stop outsourcing their chances to your imperfections.