[BigUmpJohn]

Originally posted by Dakota
Well, I am familiar with physics, and whether a leaping pitcher will be moving faster toward the batter depends on more than just one factor.

Any energy expended to launch the pitcher's body in a vertical direction is lost energy as far as speed of the pitch or moving closer to the batter is concerned. This, then, would be a net negative for the pitcher.

OTOH, friction between the pivot foot and the ground when dragging the foot is also lost energy, and a net negative. This, though, will be a small amount of energy unless the pitcher really drags the foot (as opposed to the pro forma dragging of the toe).

Landing with the stride foot prior to release will result in loss of forward energy, but that has nothing to do with whether or not the pitcher is leaping.

The optimum is probably a very small leap (to minimize lost "up vector" energy, and eliminate foot-to-ground friction). But, no umpire will call that.

The pitcher (and your Div 2 coach) probably believes greater speed is achieved by a leap, since it is hard to exert maximum forward thrust with absolutly no upward thrust.

IOW, when the pitcher gives the biggest push, some amount of leap is unavoidable unless the pitcher has near perfect body control. But, if the pitcher could exert the same amount of thrust purely in a horizontal direction, that would achieve maximum pitch speed.

Considering physics and the reality of human athletic performance, the leap probably does result in a faster pitch. But it has more to do with what physically happens to the pitcher's body at maximum drive energy than physics. IOW, the maximum drive energy results in the faster pitch, not the leap per se. And, to whatever extent the pitcher's body is moving vertically, this reduces the amount of that maximum drive energy that is delivered to the ball.

JMHA (just my humble analysis).

Any chance we could see a possible diagram plotting the vectors, friction force, applied force, etc., or some of the formulas you used like what the possible velocity might be?

[Edited by BigUmpJohn on Dec 11th, 2003 at 01:10 PM]