Fastball

[Tonker]

This is newly available on Netflix, tracing the history and some of the science of the fastball.  Lots of interviews with Goose Goosage, Nolan Ryan, Bob Gibson (who is thoroughly fucking likeable, by the way - as is Brandon Phillips, who I'd always thought was a bit of a twat), Craig Kimbrel, Justin Verlander and so on.  It features way too much Joe F. Morgan, but that aside, it's not too meatball-y and also not too technical - they're content, for example, to let the baseball players explain to you that a fastball "hops", and let the laptop statdweebs explain to you that it doesn't, without making too big a deal out of it.  There's a really interesting - and pretty sad - segment about Steve Dalkowski, and the movie's also narrated by Kevin Costner, which is nice.

Oh, and they answer the question of who threw the fastest fastball ever: Walter Johnson, Bob Feller, Nolan Ryan or Aroldis Chapman.  All in all, a well-made film that I really enjoyed.  Here's the trailer.

[Quality Start Machine]

This is newly available on Netflix, tracing the history and some of the science of the fastball.  Lots of interviews with Goose Goosage, Nolan Ryan, Bob Gibson (who is thoroughly fucking likeable, by the way - as is Brandon Phillips, who I'd always thought was a bit of a twat), Craig Kimbrel, Justin Verlander and so on.  It features way too much Joe F. Morgan, but that aside, it's not too meatball-y and also not too technical - they're content, for example, to let the baseball players explain to you that a fastball "hops", and let the laptop statdweebs explain to you that it doesn't, without making too big a deal out of it.  There's a really interesting - and pretty sad - segment about Steve Dalkowski, and the movie's also narrated by Kevin Costner, which is nice.

Oh, and they answer the question of who threw the fastest fastball ever: Walter Johnson, Bob Feller, Nolan Ryan or Aroldis Chapman.  All in all, a well-made film that I really enjoyed.  Here's the trailer.

[SKO]

With all due respect to Satchel Paige and Walter Johnson I don't buy that anyone in the f--king 1930s was throwing harder than guys today, when we've seen a rapid jump in the number of 95+ MPH fastballs and a corresponding decline in offense from 2008 to today, and I really don't buy that a guy like Walter Johnson could average 350 IP a year in his prime doing so.

[SKO]

DPD, but is this made by the same guys who made Knuckleball? Because that was also a very good documentary that followed RA Dickey during the year before his Cy Young and Tim Wakefield during his last year, while also covering the history of the pitch and guys like the Niekros.

[Yeti]

With all due respect to Satchel Paige and Walter Johnson I don't buy that anyone in the f--king 1930s was throwing harder than guys today, when we've seen a rapid jump in the number of 95+ MPH fastballs and a corresponding decline in offense from 2008 to today, and I really don't buy that a guy like Walter Johnson could average 350 IP a year in his prime doing so.

THAT

[Tonker]

DPD, but is this made by the same guys who made Knuckleball? Because that was also a very good documentary that followed RA Dickey during the year before his Cy Young and Tim Wakefield during his last year, while also covering the history of the pitch and guys like the Niekros.

I don't know whether it's the same guy, and I can't be arsed to find out any more than you can, but I can tell you that I enjoyed "Fastball" more than I did "Knuckleball".

[Quality Start Machine]

With all due respect to Satchel Paige and Walter Johnson I don't buy that anyone in the f--king 1930s was throwing harder than guys today, when we've seen a rapid jump in the number of 95+ MPH fastballs and a corresponding decline in offense from 2008 to today, and I really don't buy that a guy like Walter Johnson could average 350 IP a year in his prime doing so.

THAT

THIS.

[Tonker]

With all due respect to Satchel Paige and Walter Johnson I don't buy that anyone in the f--king 1930s was throwing harder than guys today, when we've seen a rapid jump in the number of 95+ MPH fastballs and a corresponding decline in offense from 2008 to today, and I really don't buy that a guy like Walter Johnson could average 350 IP a year in his prime doing so.

THAT

The reason that they chose Johnson, Feller, Ryan and Chapman is that, quite apart from the fact that they were all considered to be the fastest of their era, they all had their pitch speeds measured, albeit some more scientifically than others.  They take those measurements and standardise them to come to a "definitive" answer - and the winner may surprise you!

(Did I do that right?)

[Tonker]

With all due respect to Satchel Paige and Walter Johnson I don't buy that anyone in the f--king 1930s was throwing harder than guys today, when we've seen a rapid jump in the number of 95+ MPH fastballs and a corresponding decline in offense from 2008 to today, and I really don't buy that a guy like Walter Johnson could average 350 IP a year in his prime doing so.

THAT

THIS.

The point is that modern radar readings are taken ten feet from the pitchers' rubber - i.e. very shortly after the ball leaves the pitcher's hand.  What they were measuring when Feller did that experiment was the time taken from the ball crossing home, to it hitting a wall fifteen feet behind the plate - so essentially, they were measuring the ball's velocity at a point 7.5' behind the plate.  Factor in the fact that the ball slows down around 10% between leaving the pitcher's hand and crossing the plate (let alone crossing a line behind the plate), and you get some idea of how fast Feller was actually throwing.

Nonetheless, when you hear who was fastest?  You won't believe it!

[Quality Start Machine]

With all due respect to Satchel Paige and Walter Johnson I don't buy that anyone in the f--king 1930s was throwing harder than guys today, when we've seen a rapid jump in the number of 95+ MPH fastballs and a corresponding decline in offense from 2008 to today, and I really don't buy that a guy like Walter Johnson could average 350 IP a year in his prime doing so.

THAT

THIS.

The point is that modern radar readings are taken ten feet from the pitchers' rubber - i.e. very shortly after the ball leaves the pitcher's hand.  What they were measuring when Feller did that experiment was the time taken from the ball crossing home, to it hitting a wall fifteen feet behind the plate - so essentially, they were measuring the ball's velocity at a point 7.5' behind the plate.  Factor in the fact that the ball slows down around 10% between leaving the pitcher's hand and crossing the plate (let alone crossing a line behind the plate), and you get some idea of how fast Feller was actually throwing.

Nonetheless, when you hear who was fastest?  You won't believe it!

so it's a Buzzfeed documentary?

[Quality Start Machine]

With all due respect to Satchel Paige and Walter Johnson I don't buy that anyone in the f--king 1930s was throwing harder than guys today, when we've seen a rapid jump in the number of 95+ MPH fastballs and a corresponding decline in offense from 2008 to today, and I really don't buy that a guy like Walter Johnson could average 350 IP a year in his prime doing so.

I think the main difference between then and now are how many guys can hit 95 now. Guys like Paige, Johnson, Feller and Koufax were rarities in their time. Now clods like Grimm can top 95 with regularity.

[CBStew]

I have made this reference before, "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain".  For you young'uns it refers to Boston's Warren Spahn and Johnny Sain, and the fact that they didn't have a legitimate number three for a three man pitching rotation.  Great pitchers were a different breed back then.  That is not saying that they were better than today's pitchers, but that the great ones of earlier eras would be great today.  I am not going to do the research, but my sense is that they started more games and pitched longer into games than pitchers are expected today.

[SKO]

I have made this reference before, "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain".  For you young'uns it refers to Boston's Warren Spahn and Johnny Sain, and the fact that they didn't have a legitimate number three for a three man pitching rotation.  Great pitchers were a different breed back then.  That is not saying that they were better than today's pitchers, but that the great ones of earlier eras would be great today.  I am not going to do the research, but my sense is that they started more games and pitched longer into games than pitchers are expected today.

This is an undeniable fact, which is the main reason I doubt those guys sustained velocity into the mid 90s while doing so. I do not believe it possible for a human being to pitch 300 innings while sitting at 95+. That's not to say they weren't good, the great pitchers back then had great walk rates and had good pitch mixes and threw more breaking stuff, etc. I just can't buy that your average fastball in the 1930s wasn't at least 4-5 mph slower than the average fastball today, when the average fastball right now is a good 1-2 mph faster than it was as recently as 2008.

[Tonker]

I have made this reference before, "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain".  For you young'uns it refers to Boston's Warren Spahn and Johnny Sain, and the fact that they didn't have a legitimate number three for a three man pitching rotation.  Great pitchers were a different breed back then.  That is not saying that they were better than today's pitchers, but that the great ones of earlier eras would be great today.  I am not going to do the research, but my sense is that they started more games and pitched longer into games than pitchers are expected today.

I don't think you'd need to research very hard, Stew.  Warren Spahn pitched a 162-game average of 252 innings and 18 CGs per year over his entire 21-year career, hitting 310 and 26 in 1951.  Walter Johnson pitched 274 innings and 25 CGs per year for 21 years, with 371 and 33 in 1914.  Even Nolan Ryan pitched 232 innings and 10 CG a year over a mind-boggling 27 seasons, including 332 and 26 in 1974.

By contrast, none other than our beloved Mad Dog pitched merely 229 innings and 5 CG per year on average (highs of just 268 and 9 in 1992) and even those numbers are way, way ahead of anything that anybody will get to in a modern career.  Kershaw's best?  233 and 5 in 2011.

[Tonker]

I have made this reference before, "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain".  For you young'uns it refers to Boston's Warren Spahn and Johnny Sain, and the fact that they didn't have a legitimate number three for a three man pitching rotation.  Great pitchers were a different breed back then.  That is not saying that they were better than today's pitchers, but that the great ones of earlier eras would be great today.  I am not going to do the research, but my sense is that they started more games and pitched longer into games than pitchers are expected today.

This is an undeniable fact, which is the main reason I doubt those guys sustained velocity into the mid 90s while doing so. I do not believe it possible for a human being to pitch 300 innings while sitting at 95+. That's not to say they weren't good, the great pitchers back then had great walk rates and had good pitch mixes and threw more breaking stuff, etc. I just can't buy that your average fastball in the 1930s wasn't at least 4-5 mph slower than the average fastball today, when the average fastball right now is a good 1-2 mph faster than it was as recently as 2008.

Watch the film.  When you see who the fastest pitcher ever is, your jaw will drop!