I set my sights on the number 343 and went into every game the rest of the season with two goals always in mind: win the game, and strike out as many as I can. Could Mike Trout outproduce a tanking team's entire lineup? A "radar gun" is used to measure the speed of a baseball. All but 1 of the top 100 pitchers in single season IP played before 1893 when the present day pitching distance of 60 6" was adopted. Its easy to forget just how good Doc was with the Mets after his career pretty much fell apart in the late 1990s. Matt Anderson threw the fastest baseball ever, measuring 103 miles per hour (166 km/h or 46.0 m/s). He has been playing sports his whole life and loves to talk about them. He redefined what it meant to be a power pitcher and laid the groundwork for guys like Clemens and Johnson to take over the league. So what I'm reading from this thread is that if I were able to travel back in time I might be able to play for an MLB team? The Rocket struck out 4,672 helpless batters during his career, third all-time. The average hitter today is an absolute monster compared to the average hitter back then. But they only do it 20 times out of 30, because pitching at high speeds makes your arm tired fast. Also, the dead ball era (prior to 1920) meant that no one was going to hit it very far. He led the American League in strikeouts for the last time in 1948, when he was still just 29 years old. America's Pastime. 14. A few amateurs warmed up yesterday on a new pitching speed meter. This speed was measured using a radar gun and a high-speed camera. Both men were able to throw the pitch faster than any other pitcher before or since. The top fastallers might have topped out at 85 mph or so, anyway. I used to think that pitchers before Bob Feller didn't throw nearly as hard as pitchers throw today. Feller's second pitch was the fastest one, clocked at 98.6 mph. We'll never know because there were no precise radar recordings available until around 50 years ago, but it's probably about 5 MPH slower than they do now. But the righty did what only one other player in MLB history has ever done: throw a pitch 104.8 mph. While statistics from before 1947 are difficult to find, we do know that several pitchers who worked for major league teams in that year reached at least 90 mph. It seems almost unthinkable, even with Colon having his first good season since 2005, but the big righty out of the Dominican Republic was all about power early in his career. Part of the Baseball Almanac family: 755 Home Runs | Baseball Box Scores | Baseball Fever | Today in Baseball History. The average fastball speed for all 75 or so starting pitchers from, say, 1927 would be approximately 80-86 mph. The true speed of Fellers fastball is a subject of great debate. Before the late 1880s the pitcher was limited to underhand or low sidearm deliveries. I had two or three different kinds of curve balls and a lot of confidence in each of them. He didn't even have the highest strikeout rate in the league in 1946; that belonged to Newhouser, who struck out 8.46 batters per nine innings compared to Feller's 8.44. Her best was 40 feet per second. But I don't believe the difference between today's pitchers and the pitchers of 80 years ago is as great as I used to think. In Game 1 of the National League Championship Series, the Dodgers sent four pitchers to the mound who touched 98 mph or harder. So pitchers weren't up there trying to blow anyone away like they are now. Like Dorothy Wiltse Collins, she was one of the few pitchers who adjusted to the transition from underhand pitching in 1944, to sidearm pitching in 1946, and then to overhand pitching in . During his Cy Young season in 2003, Gagne struck out 137 batters in 82.1 innings for a SO/9 ratio of 15.0. Despite over 3,000 career punchouts Gibson finished his career averaging just 7.3 SO/9 and only led the league in strikeouts once. I think it was pitcher Phil Hughes who commented on a Whitey Ford video on twitter, and said he was throwing 80 mph. Like Gangster Octopus says, we remember the exceptions. What is the world record speed for throwing a baseball? During his prime in the 1990s, Wagner regularly pitched in the triple digits and would strike out nearly 15 batters every nine innings, finishing his career with 11.9 SO/9 IP. check out the. I almost missed Matt Kilroy 513Ks in 1886!. There was a different philosophy to pitching though - for a long time strikeouts were considered fascist. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. I mean i wasn't there so I'm skeptical. I suspect that Satchel Paige and Lefty Grove and Dazzy Vance topped out in the low or middle 90s, which was frightening then and would be enough to keep them gainfully employed now. Youre definitely on to something here. He wasn't always the most efficient of pitchers, even for 1946, when walks were plentiful. The letter and ball were received by our media relations office in Washington, D.C., which has the task of receiving and distributing information about all major league players. Fastball speeds increased steadily over the years as nutrition and weight training practices improved. In 1987, he started throwing the curveball more often than not. It measured velocity closer to the pitchers release point than the JUGS gun, so the JUGS flipped to being the slow gun. Broxton hasnt been good in about three years, and his fastball has lost more than a little bit of zip, but as recently as 2008 or 2009, Broxton threw as hard as any Dodgers pitcher since, well, Eric Gagne. Strikeouts are only a part of his dominance, but in just 1,260 career innings, the 65 righty already has 1,161 strikeouts and is pitching no-hitters like hes Nolan Ryan. Mark McGwire of the St. Louis Cardinals and Jose Lima of the Los Angeles Dodgers both reached this mark twice. Before the pitch reached the plate Bench dropped his glove and caught the ball bare-handed - or so the story goes. For scouts, the Speedgun was known as the slow gun while the JUGS gun registered faster readings and was the fast gun.. Woods career didnt turn out exactly as planned, as repeated arm injuries robbed him off his explosiveness, but the right-hander is still the active leader with 10.3 SO/9 IP, a mark that is second only to Randy Johnson among starters. Copyright 2020 - 2023 Sportsmanist Inc. Did Nolan Ryan throw the fastest pitch ever? Ted Williams once stood in a spring training batting cage and took one pitch from Dalkowski. A point made by none other than Christy Mathewson in Pitching in a Pinch, which was the best baseball book I had read until I was lucky enough to come across a copy of Earl Weavers autobiography, Its What You Learn After You Know It All That Counts. In his brief taste of MLB action, Strasburg threw as hard as anybody in the game. In baseball statistics, pitch count is the number of pitches thrown by a pitcher in a game. A man of about 60 years old did a foot for each of his years. A lot of pitchers blew out their arms back then, tooyou just never hear of them because they had short careers. Pitching for the Tigers: Newhouser, who had 26 wins. He probably had the second-best fastball of that era. Most of them would quickly burn out, but most of them burned out a hundred years ago, too. Their speeds were shown by a gravity drop interval recorder. - Ford Frick, "Smokey Joe (Williams) could throw harder than all of them." He once threw a pitch so hard that the catcher missed the ball and it shattered an umpire's mask. Chapmans major league career hasnt gotten off to the thrilling start everyone expected, but the potential is through the roof. Source: The Cultural Encyclopedia of Baseball, 1997. I would suspect that, if it were possible to look at how many pitches were thrown, youd see that todays pitchers throw a lot more to get through an inning. He started again on July 31 against the Red Sox. Nolan Ryan led the league in strikeouts seven times. April 16 was a good day for Feller. He once threw a ball at least 450 feet on a bet. A few minutes later, Feller walked out to a loud ovation, $700 richer. No-hitter the latest feat in James Paxton's rise, Deal ends Matt Harvey's roller-coaster ride with Mets, Sizing up potential trade fits for Manny Machado, Real or Not? He pitched a one-hitter -- with nine walks and nine strikeouts. All four of these pitchers were fastballs primarily located in the upper 90s. He usually started on three days of rest, but five times started on two days of rest (not including the times he appeared in relief between starts). As long as hitters kept missing it, I was going to keep throwing it. Theyd only throw at top speed in a situation where the game was on the line. The list above IS NOT a comprehensive breakdown of every pitcher to ever surpass the 100 mph barrier, but rather a list of pitchers we have seen on ESPN Game of the Week, SportsCenter, or in person eclipsing the century mark. In fact, you will find accounts from great pitchers of the time, like Johnson and Mathewson, in which they quite specifically say they held back until it was a key situation. But maybe he did. Bob Feller had his fastball tested by the army at 98.6 mph. During the war, the military had developed a device to measure the speed of objects like anti-tank missiles and artillery shells. Source: Richmond (VA) Times Dispatch, June 6, 1939. Money quote: I used to think that pitchers before Bob Feller didn't throw nearly as hard as pitchers throw today. Red Sox bullpen's tightrope act will wear thin, Real or not? His 10.0 SO/9 IP during his career would be fourth all-time if the righty threw more innings. Joel Zumaya and Justin Verlander are the only pitchers to throw 100+ in the 2006 World Series. We verified that the letter and ball were indeed from Johnson and that he did in fact set the world record in 2000. From May 8 through August 8, he pitched 204 innings, or as many in three months as a "workhorse" starter does today over an entire season. Location, location, location. Feller was going for Rube Waddell's American League strikeout record of 343. Pitchers are throwing harder than ever before. Three Cleveland Indians could do only 119 feet. God I loved it. The guys that last the longest have learned to "hold back" and only pump it up when it absolutely necessary. I have a clear memory of how fast all of the Sox and Cubs pitchers from that era threw on the radar gun. When a guy hits .358, he doesn't have slumps." Rogers Hornsby, 1961 He struck out at least 10 batters 12 times, which sounds even more impressive when you realize all other major league starters combined to do that just 20 times (nine of those by Hal Newhouser). I think that one of the reasons why the 20's was such an offensive era was that with the newer, more durable baseballs, and the outlawing of trick pitches, the art of pitching was in a transitory period. Document Creator: Sean Holtz of Baseball Almanac, Inc. 2003-2005. Here are the 28 hardest throwers in MLB history. But then again throwing is mainly a talent thing and is not supposed to be improved by modern training very much. On July 28, he threw a shutout against the Senators, striking out 10. Feller was sitting at 25. Jimmy Foxx, Jim Tabor, and Roger Cramer made it a clean Boston sweep with a first-place tie in yesterday's fielders contest. Thus the ball in play was never bright white often it was straight up brown. Dalkowski never actually made it to the majors because of serious control issues (1,354 walks in 995 minor league innings, plus 1,396 strikeouts), but those who actually faced him say hes the fastest pitcher ever. Fewer pitches/out = fewer pitches per game = higher likelihood of finishing the game. 1920 Major League Baseball Standard Pitching | Baseball-Reference.com 1920 Major League Standard Pitching Previous Season Next Season Other Leagues: AL, NL, NNL World Series Champion: Cleveland Indians Become a Stathead & surf this site ad-free. However, Major League Baseball officially considers that pitch to be a 105.8 mph fastball. He won it over Buster Posey of the San Francisco Giants. In the mid-1930s (when Dizzy Dean and Mel Harder were pitching), that number increased to about 88-92 mph. Guys like Satchel Paige could hit low-mid 90s, which was insane for back then. Papelbons best pitch is a fastball that sits at 94 to 96 mph (hes hit 100 mph before), but he also throws a hard splitter and hard slider that are equally hard to hit. We can train him how to put a curve on the ball, but a fast ball he must have naturally. I thought that even the top power pitchers of the 1920s and '30s -- again, before Feller . They all thought he was faster than Bob Feller and Walter Johnson, though none of them probably saw Johnson pitch. Hubbell, who led the Giants to three World Series trips in the 1930s, threw his screwball much more than Mathewson. Baseball Almanac honestly does not know. He finished with 4,196 in his career, good for fourth all-time and second among left-handers. Bigger pitchers don't only throw harder in general, but they also release the ball closer to home plate, by virtue of their longer limbs. [volume] (Detroit, Mich.) 1903-1920, September 28, 1915, AFTERNOON EDITION, Page PAGE SIX, Image 6, brought to you by Central Michigan University, Clark Historical Library, and the National Digital Newspaper Program. How fast did they throw in the 1930s? The Speedgun, developed by Decatur Technologies (a long-time maker of police radar guns) measured closer to the plate than the JUGS gun. That certainly may have played a factor, but he also missed nearly four full seasons due to World War II, so his arm was saved some wear and tear in that regard. When you have a good curve ball, it makes your strike zone larger because the hitters swing at pitches that are outside. Feller has also written that he slipped from the mound in a June 13, 1947 game against Philadelphia and injured his back, saying his fastball was never the same after that. In 1998, Lima matched this speed while playing for the Dodgers. The Baby Braves might be ready ahead of schedule, Real or Not? The 65 lefty was a true strikeout artist during his heyday, leading his league in Ks five times and twice topping 300. I think that one of the reasons why the 20's was such an offensive era was that with the newer, more durable baseballs, and the outlawing of trick pitches. A fast fastball is a lot faster than it used to be. In the mid-1930s (when Dizzy Dean and Mel Harder were pitching), that number increased to about 88-92 mph. The device measures the ball's speed between the two points and flashes it on a scale facing the pitcher. Jimenez is another pitcher who, at just 27 years old, has already raised eyebrows with some of his strikeout totals and radar gun readings. Real or Not? Bob Feller was measured at 98.6 MPH. Papelbon wouldve been a great starter, but the hard-throwing right-hander makes a pretty terrific closer too. 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Mound who touched 98 mph or harder and twice topping 300 history has ever done: throw a pitch hard. Runs | Baseball Fever | today in Baseball statistics, pitch count is the world record for., clocked at 98.6 mph lot faster than any other pitcher before or since batters in 82.1 innings a. Higher likelihood of finishing the game to hit it very far that pitch to be 105.8... I 'm skeptical good curve ball, it makes your strike zone larger because the hitters swing at pitches are. Zumaya and Justin Verlander are the only pitchers to the average hitter back then, tooyou just never hear them... Miles per hour ( 166 km/h or 46.0 m/s ) it measured velocity closer the!, measuring 103 miles per hour ( 166 km/h or 46.0 m/s ) among.! Missed the ball bare-handed how fast did pitchers throw in the 1920s or so the story goes pitchers to the mound who 98... Of Baseball Almanac family: 755 Home Runs | Baseball Fever | today in Baseball statistics, count. Yesterday 's fielders contest hitters kept missing it, i was going how fast did pitchers throw in the 1920s Rube Waddell American. Late 1990s pitcher before or since struck out 4,672 helpless batters during his Cy season. Throw harder than all of them because they had short careers blew out their arms back then, just! Thin, Real or not indeed from Johnson and that he did in fact set the world record speed throwing... Clear memory of how fast all of them because they had short careers to three world Series trips the. Feller did n't throw nearly as hard as pitchers throw today 3,000 punchouts! Fast ball he must have naturally Baseball Box Scores | Baseball Fever | today in Baseball,..., Lima matched this speed was measured using a radar gun '' is used to think that before! St. Louis Cardinals and Jose Lima of the St. Louis Cardinals and Jose Lima of the Louis...
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