Another thing users of this forum normally understand is that the degree of crampedness or not is nothing particularly connected with the airframe type. It is up to the airline to put in as many as they wish to up to the designated maximum. If you want to comment on Continental's selected seat pitch, fair enough, but it's nothing to stick on Embraer, or RJs in general.
Pitch isnīt - an airline is free to rip out seat rows and increase pitch as they please, by small increments.
But width and height matter more.
With 16 rows or so on ERJ-145, ripping out 1 row would lose 3 seats and add 2 inches pitch to each remaining row - 32 inches to 34 inches
As for width, with 3 seats abreast the only option would be to go 2 abreast, and this would sacrifice a third of the seats. Like on Embraer Legacy Shuttle. And on a luxury Legacy executive, passengers still cannot stand up, because even if the aisle is more in the middle, floor to ceiling is still 182 cm.
CRJ-200 is wider than ERJ-145.