Rising fastball

[BigUmp56]

Originally Posted by NIump50

No, I'm very aware that he thought a ball cannot rise.
My point is that he admits the baseball is unpredictable and the equations cannot or at least have not been solved.
If the equations are not solved and the ball is unpredictable it means the science is not exact and most likely they are missing something. Perhaps the missing something explains a rising fastball.
Since there are many first hand accounts from many players from different eras proclaiming a rising ball and some scientists admit to the unpredictability of the ball and also admit that for some reason they cannot solve the equations that perhaps if it looks like a riser, feels like a riser and tastes like a riser, it just might be.

So, we're back to "It looks like it rises, so it must be rising." Dr. Adair never maintained that the equations could not be solved to disprove the myth of the rising fastball. His contention was, and still is, that the predetermined flight path held too many variables to calculate lateral and/or downward movement to a certainty.


Tim.

[NIump50]

Originally Posted by BigUmp56

So, we're back to "It looks like it rises, so it must be rising." Dr. Adair never maintained that the equations could not be solved to disprove the myth of the rising fastball. His contention was, and still is, that the predetermined flight path held too many variables to calculate lateral and/or downward movement to a certainty.


Tim.

Are you admitting that some balls 'appear' to be rising?
If so, why?
And if the reason is the drop isn't as much as expected therefore it 'appears' to rise, then please explain why a 85 mph fastball never appears to rise.

[BigUmp56]

Who said that an 85 mph fastball doesn't appear to rise? It certainly wasn't me. It's all about perception and expectation. If a batter is looking for a 65 mph bender and a pitcher throws an 85 mph heater the ball will get on him much quicker that he expected and he will perceive that the ball exploded, or rose as it reached the plate. It seems to me that you wan't someone else to do the work for you. There are many, many articles on this subject available on the Internet. If you really want to know why the rising fastball is an optical illusion you need to some work for yourself.



Tim.

[NIump50]

Originally Posted by BigUmp56

Who said that an 85 mph fastball doesn't appear to rise? It certainly wasn't me. It's all about perception and expectation. If a batter is looking for a 65 mph bender and a pitcher throws an 85 mph heater the ball will get on him much quicker that he expected and he will perceive that the ball exploded, or rose as it reached the plate. It seems to me that you wan't someone else to do the work for you. There are many, many articles on this subject available on the Internet. If you really want to know why the rising fastball is an optical illusion you need to some work for yourself.



Tim.

I know exactly the explanation given for the supposed optical illusion.
I also know that an "exploding" fastball is not a rising fastball.
If a batter is expecting offspeed and gets a fastball his timing is screwed but he's not saying the ball is rising.
Of all the pitchers that legend has given the rising fastball ability, none have topped out at 85 with their fastball. No one has ever accused Greg Maddux of having a rising fastball, yet over the years he has confounded, confused and kept more hitters off balance than anyone else. If the optical illusion of a rising fastball was simply expecting one speed and the actual speed being 5-10 faster then Maddux should be the king of the rising fastball.
Like I've said in prior posts, the logic of the optical illusion doesn't add up.
You knew what I was driving at and you avoided the issue because you can't explain it.

[UmpJM]

I was just wondering if any of you guys have ever had any luck with teaching a pig to sing?

I tried with mine once, but after a while he just seemed to get kind of pissed off.

Never did sing worth a damn.

In retrospect, I think it might have been a waste of my time to even try.

JM

[BigUmp56]

Originally Posted by NIump50

I know exactly the explanation given for the supposed optical illusion.
I also know that an "exploding" fastball is not a rising fastball.
If a batter is expecting offspeed and gets a fastball his timing is screwed but he's not saying the ball is rising.
Of all the pitchers that legend has given the rising fastball ability, none have topped out at 85 with their fastball. No one has ever accused Greg Maddux of having a rising fastball, yet over the years he has confounded, confused and kept more hitters off balance than anyone else. If the optical illusion of a rising fastball was simply expecting one speed and the actual speed being 5-10 faster then Maddux should be the king of the rising fastball.
Like I've said in prior posts, the logic of the optical illusion doesn't add up.
You knew what I was driving at and you avoided the issue because you can't explain it.

Since you insist.




For years batters swore that some pitchers could throw a rising fastball. The laws of physics say this is impossible. Instead, it's an illusion caused when the pitcher throws a faster pitch than the batter has seen. In bottom figure b, the batter watches the ball for the first part of its flight and calculates its drop. Then he looks down at the bat and the ball appears to have jumped because it's higher than where his mental model predicted it would be, based on earlier, slower pitches as shown in the top illustration. (Graphic by Alison Habel)


By Ed Stiles
February 18, 2000

Baseball is numbers to Terry Bahill, as well - but of a different kind. The University of Arizona professor of systems and industrial engineering has used numbers, graphs and mathematical analysis to investigate some of baseball's more intriguing questions, most of which center around that half second between the time a pitcher releases the ball and the moment the batter hits it.


The Rising Fastball —

For years batters swore that some pitchers could throw a rising fastball that would "jump" a half foot as it crossed the plate, making it hop over the bat. But this isn't possible, Bahill says. Even the greatest pitchers can't violate the laws of physics. Once a ball is thrown, it follows a smooth trajectory. Physics simply doesn't allow abrupt jumps in that trajectory.


So what's happening? "The batter is using the wrong mental model," Bahill says.

Batters divide a pitch into thirds. The first third is sensory gathering, the second is computing, and the third is swinging. So a pitcher throws several 90-mph fastballs and the batter develops a mental model and reaction to this speed, Bahill says.

Then the pitcher slips in a 95-mph fastball. During the sensory gathering segment of the pitch, the batter doesn't see anything different. He calculates where the 90-mph fastball would go and swings at that spot. But the 95-mph fastball has a flatter trajectory. It doesn't drop quite as much from the pitcher to plate because it's going faster.

"When the batter starts to swing, he takes his eye off the ball to look at the predicted bat-ball collision point," Bahill says. "When the ball comes back into his view, it is higher than his mental model predicted and he sees it 'jump' higher than where he calculated that it would be."



Tim.

[NIump50]

Originally Posted by BigUmp56

Since you insist.




For years batters swore that some pitchers could throw a rising fastball. The laws of physics say this is impossible. Instead, it's an illusion caused when the pitcher throws a faster pitch than the batter has seen. In bottom figure b, the batter watches the ball for the first part of its flight and calculates its drop. Then he looks down at the bat and the ball appears to have jumped because it's higher than where his mental model predicted it would be, based on earlier, slower pitches as shown in the top illustration. (Graphic by Alison Habel)


By Ed Stiles
February 18, 2000

Baseball is numbers to Terry Bahill, as well - but of a different kind. The University of Arizona professor of systems and industrial engineering has used numbers, graphs and mathematical analysis to investigate some of baseball's more intriguing questions, most of which center around that half second between the time a pitcher releases the ball and the moment the batter hits it.


The Rising Fastball —

For years batters swore that some pitchers could throw a rising fastball that would "jump" a half foot as it crossed the plate, making it hop over the bat. But this isn't possible, Bahill says. Even the greatest pitchers can't violate the laws of physics. Once a ball is thrown, it follows a smooth trajectory. Physics simply doesn't allow abrupt jumps in that trajectory.


So what's happening? "The batter is using the wrong mental model," Bahill says.

Batters divide a pitch into thirds. The first third is sensory gathering, the second is computing, and the third is swinging. So a pitcher throws several 90-mph fastballs and the batter develops a mental model and reaction to this speed, Bahill says.

Then the pitcher slips in a 95-mph fastball. During the sensory gathering segment of the pitch, the batter doesn't see anything different. He calculates where the 90-mph fastball would go and swings at that spot. But the 95-mph fastball has a flatter trajectory. It doesn't drop quite as much from the pitcher to plate because it's going faster.

"When the batter starts to swing, he takes his eye off the ball to look at the predicted bat-ball collision point," Bahill says. "When the ball comes back into his view, it is higher than his mental model predicted and he sees it 'jump' higher than where he calculated that it would be."



Tim.

In your illustration, the trajectory of the ball for the first 20 feet would take the ball just below the neck of the batter, yet the pitch finishes waist high.
What speed would this pitch be for that amount of drop? Assuming it is a fastball and assuming a normal sized man that would be about a 16 to 18" drop from the initial trajectory.
I'm guessing that's about a 50-60 mile an hour gasser.
I can't count the number of 12 yr old games I've done where the kid was bringing 55 mph heat, the ball was dropping 16" and everyone in the crowd was gasping WOW did you see that ball jump.

If a pitch is released at 5' above home plate with an initial trajectory that plots out to 3' above home plate, after drag and gravity and all that other good stuff, at what heighth will a 100 mph fastball be when it crosses the plate? How about a 90 and 85mph ball?

[SAump]

Originally Posted by NIump50

If a pitch is released at 5' above home plate with an initial trajectory that plots out to 3' above home plate, after drag and gravity and all that other good stuff, at what height will a 100 mph fastball be when it crosses the plate? How about a 90 and 85mph ball?

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Can you handle the truth?
Which numbers do you want to see?

The argument that a RISING fastball cannot be thrown overhand is definitely TRUE at all speeds below 70 mph. 88 mph was a special number. I never argued that this rising fastball concept wasn't TRUE between 70 and 90 mph as well. I also did the math work and came up with some very interesting numbers, 93 mph, 96 mph and 98 mph. Somehow this work disappeared when the original AUTHOR HIT the DELETE thread BUTTON.

To be sure that my calculations were CORRECT, I rounded these figures to an even 100 mph. I located a page of MLB pitchers who were all clocked at throwing baseballs at over a 100 mph. I even noticed that many pitchers were not on the table because someone never officialy clocked them on RADAR. I also noted that NOLAN RYAN's speed was clocked just above 101 mph, even though he was reported to have thrown a 105 mph baseball in his time in the minors. There was also a minor leaguer who could chunk the ball from home plate over the center field wall that didn't make the list.

But the memories of my missing DATA, my missing numbered proofs, my missing initial attempts at introducing/explaining RISE are now GONE from the record. So sad! Barry Bonds must be nervous about adding that asterick.