To many, baseball is known as America’s pastime. They find it enjoyable to watch two teams strategize against each other in order to win each individual game. Many factors combine together to affect the outcome of the game. Usually the team with the most quality hits, fewest errors, and best pitching wins. One of the most important of these factors is decent pitching. If the pitcher is struggling it’s easier for the other team to get on base and score.
Pitching a ball both fast and accurate is more difficult than it may seem. These factors all depend on how the pitcher controls his body, or how well his mechanics all come together. This is a big reason why people started looking into, and studying, Biomechanics. Biomechanics is the study of the human body and how it moves. Biomechanists take advancements in engineering and mechanics and apply them to see what effects they have on the body and how they can improve production.
When pitching, the pitcher needs to understand the different ways to use their body and learn about all of the different ways to throw the ball. Most people choose which way to throw based on how comfortable it is to them, but injury risk is also a huge factor. Biomechanics show people the best way to throw to achieve the highest success and avoid injuries.
Many pitching experts have separated pitching into phases. Not all of them agree on exactly how many steps there are, but the consensus is six core phases. It is important for pitchers to learn and properly perform each phase to cut down the risk of injuring your arm. The six phases are as follows:
The Windup: The Windup is generally used when there are no runners on base. For this reason some biomechanists believe it shouldn’t be included in the list ...
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Pitching puts a large amount of stress on the pitcher’s body, especially the elbow and arm. The reason for this is that the act of pitching contains so many unnatural body movements. The body is not made to make the jerky movements that are involved in pitching. Some of the forces that affect the body during pitching include gravitational force and the resistance of the ball. Even though the ball is small and you wouldn’t think the resistance force is very high, you would be surprised at how large of a difference it makes and how much it actually affects your body.
So as a recap the six phases of pitching are:
• The Windup
• The Stride
• Arm Cocking
• Arm Acceleration
• Arm Deceleration
• The Follow Through
Just remember these steps, and with a little bit of practice you could be a good pitcher in no time.
Works Cited
sciencebuddies.org
a 39yearold knuckle ball pitcher who currently plays Major League Baseball for the Toronto Blue Jays
...itchers who started out by only being allowed to throw under hand and now presently they are able to about five to ten different types of pitches overhand. Several records also have been broken like Mark McGwire breaking Roger Maris's thirty seven year old homerun record.
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The game of baseball can be divided into three broad categories: hitting, pitching, and defense. No other facet of the game gets as much attention as hitting. For example, every year the MLB puts on a home run derby. No other part of the game draws as much attention. The traditional statistic that measure hitting ability is batting average (BA or AVG). To find a players batting averag...
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When most people think of pitching they think of a person hurling a 5 oz. ball with 216 red stitches as hard as they can from 60’6”. Well they are right, but there is so much more to it. When I looked at pitching I saw situations, fastballs, curveballs, and change-ups. When physics was introduced to me I saw much more to baseball. I see forces generated and at work against each other, I see the Magnus effect functioning most of the time. Let’s look at how force is generated through a pitcher.
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If you hit the ball at a bat's "nodes", the frequencies (each bat vibrates at several low and high frequencies at once, which is like the harmonics of stringed instruments) cancel out and since this happens you don't feel the sting in your hands that you experience when you hit the ball at different points on the bat.
Baseball is considered America’s past time. Legends like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jackie Robinson, and many more have come and gone. Throughout baseball’s history certain players have excelled more than others, and like any sport they were successful by exploiting their strengths. It isn’t the rules, uniforms, stadiums, and fan base that make baseball a beautiful sport; it’s the players. Anyone competing, whether it is at a professional level or not, has their own unique mechanics that allows them to perform the best they can. No pitcher throws the ball the same way as another and no batter hits the ball the same way as another. Every baseball player has a routine in everything they do that makes them special. It has been said that hitting a baseball is the hardest task in all of sports. To accomplish that task, all factors come in to play; the type of pitch being thrown, the release point of the pitch, the break of the ball, etc. All those factors occur before the batter’s swing is fully initiated. As mentioned earlier, no batter swings the same way as another however, the mechanics of a swing is a different thing entirely. The mechanics of one’s swing begins when a batter enters the box and ends when a batter exits, what happens in between is up to the batter. By perfecting a batter’s mechanics while in the box, their chances of making contact increase greatly.
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Baseball is known as America’s national pastime, and has been played for over 100 years. Baseball can be a lot of fun, but is also extremely challenging to play, especially trying to hit a 90 mile per hour fastball. I am a very devoted baseball player myself, and over the years I have learned numerous key things about the game. Baseball does not only require physical strength to hit and throw the ball, but it also requires a great mindset, such as, mental preparedness, concentration, and a positive attitude.
The process of becoming a great baseball player takes talent, hard work, and a ton of practice. Baseball, being the second hardest sport in the world is a hard sport to stay discipline at. As a player, he must make sure he works at all the drills everyday, boring or not. Also, he must have the mental mind set that he definitely wants to make it to the big leagues, if he doesn’t, then its ...
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