A screwball is a breaking ball designed to move in the opposite direction of just about every other breaking pitch. It is one of the rarest pitches thrown in baseball, mostly because of the tax it can put on a pitcher's arm. The movement on the screwball -- which travels toward the pitcher's arm side -- is caused by an extremely unorthodox throwing motion.
In throwing the screwball, the pitcher snaps his wrist in a manner that causes his palm to face away from his glove side. This is in stark contrast to sliders and curveballs, for which a pitcher snaps his wrist so that the palm is facing the glove side.
Because of the awkward arm motion, a screwball is exponentially tougher to throw than a curveball. But, in theory, it should have the same effect as a curve -- only breaking in the opposite direction.
Origin
The origins of the screwball are very difficult to trace, as it was considered to simply be a different version of a curveball in its early years. Hall of Famer Carl Hubbell, who used the screwball to rejuvenate his career, brought notoriety to the pitch.
Héctor Santiago and Brent Honeywell are two of the more recent pitchers to throw a screwball.
The film critic Andrew Sarris has defined the screwball comedy as "a sex comedy without the sex." Like farce, screwball comedies often involve masquerades and disguises in which a character or characters resort to secrecy.
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Screwball_comedy
In baseball, a breaking ball is a pitch that does not travel straight as it approaches the batter; it will have sideways or downward motion on it, sometimes both (see slider). A breaking ball is not a specific pitch by that name, but is any pitch that "breaks", such as a curveball, slider, or screwball.
designed to move in the opposite direction of just about every other breaking pitch. It is one of the rarest pitches thrown in baseball, mostly because of the tax it can put on a pitcher's arm.
Few pitchers throw a screwball for a simple reason: it hurts. It requires rotating the arm inward toward the body, a clockwise motion for a left-hander, the opposite of a curve.
Sewell's teammate Maurice Van Robays took care of that. He concocted the name "eephus" and when asked why, he responded by saying, "Eephus ain't nothing, and that's a nothing pitch." In Hebrew, the word "efes" can be loosely translated into "nothing," and the word "eephus" undoubtedly stems from that.
Nasty. But Uribe also has a four-seam fastball that can be even more overpowering: His four-seamer averaged 100.7 mph -- the fourth-fastest fastball in the Majors -- and topped out at 103.3 mph, a top-five max velo for any pitcher. Yet he only threw it 7% of the time.
Bill "Spaceman" Lee threw an eephus referred to as the "Leephus", "spaceball" or "moon ball". Pitching for the Boston Red Sox against the Cincinnati Reds in Game 7 of the 1975 World Series, the Red Sox were up 3–0 when, on a 1–0 count, Lee threw an eephus pitch to Tony Pérez with a runner on base.
Eephus. Originally thrown by Rip Sewell of the Pittsburgh Pirates over 80 years ago, the eephus is thrown at a very slow speed and tends to have a high arc to it. The pitch isn't thrown too often, but Carlos Zambrano and Kazuhito Tadano have used it in recent years.
Bill Wambsganss executed an unassisted triple play in the 1920 World Series. The rarest type of triple play, and one of the rarest events of any kind in baseball, is for a single fielder to complete all three outs in one play.
As a reminder, pitchers can use rosin or other league-approved substances to help them grip the baseballs, but they cannot go beyond that to substances such as spider tack, pine tar or a now-notorious mixture of sunscreen with sweat and other readily available things during the course of a game.
Aroldis Chapman officially holds the Guinness World Record for fastest baseball pitch with a 105.8 mph fastball. On Sept. 24, 2010, the Cincinnati Reds' pitcher set the record with a high-velocity pitch against the San Diego Padres.
The first recorded unassisted triple play in Major League Baseball (MLB) history occurred on May 8, 1878, when Paul Hines of the Providence Grays accomplished the feat. Since then, there have been fewer than 15 instances of unassisted triple plays in MLB history, making it an exceedingly rare occurrence.
What is the fastest pitch ever thrown? Aroldis Chapman officially holds the Guinness World Record for fastest baseball pitch with a 105.8 mph fastball. On Sept. 24, 2010, the Cincinnati Reds' pitcher set the record with a high-velocity pitch against the San Diego Padres.
Charles Henry "Red" Barrett (February 14, 1915 – July 28, 1990) was an American Major League Baseball pitcher who played 11 total career seasons in the National League. He played for the Cincinnati Reds, Boston Braves and St. Louis Cardinals. He once pitched the shortest complete game by fewest pitches (58) in history.
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