Pitchers are taught at a young age to throw strikes. "Just go out there and throw strikes" a Little League coach might tell his young hurler. That's fine at that age because it teaches control, but the problem with throwing strikes is that hitters can hit strikes. What big-league pitchers try to do is paint the corners or get the hitters chasing balls out of the strike zone with their breaking stuff. There is a difference between a strike and a good strike in baseball, and Greg Maddux was the ultimate master to support this. He worked the strike zone brilliantly and this is why he is sure to be a first ballot Hall of Famer.
The hitter's strike zone is the area over home plate from the top of the shoulders to just below the kneecap. This leaves the catcher up to nine zones in which to set up. These zones vary however because of human error by the umpire and the batter's stance at the plate. This does not mean that a pitcher needs to throw a fastball down the middle though, because if he does the fans in the bleachers will get a lot of souvenirs that day and the pitcher might receive a plane ticket to the minor leagues. He simply needs to make adjustments and mix up his speeds better. Work up and down and in and out and utilize his breaking stuff. A good, hard slider will look like it's headed right down the middle and "slide" at the last moment leaving the batter to hit a weak ground ball off the end of the bat or jam him inside. That's just one example of the many pitches a pitcher might have in his repertoire which supports the case that good pitching will beat good hitting any day. The next time that you watch a game on television, and that pitch tracker strike zone (that the umpires hate so much) shows up on the screen, take notice of how many pitches are in the middle of the plate. You might be surprised at what you see.
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