January 20th, 2014 - How to throw a curveball

I played baseball up until the ninth grade.  It started with tee-ball, and progressed to coach-pitch leagues.  Then came the mind-numbing years directly after coach pitch where maybe 1 in every 10 made it in the vicinity of the plate.  There's a video my dad made of one these games.  In the video, you can actually see the camera shake and bob.  It's not because anything seismically happened on that day in Maine.  It's because my dad fell asleep while filming.

Little League came next.  In the Bath Recreational District, Little League was divided into two groups, the Majors and the Minors (judging by my prowess in other physical endeavors, I'll let you guess what group I ended up starting in).  I did get better, and when I moved to New Orleans for middle school, I was a pretty adept 1st Baseman. I did, on occasion, "pitch."  I say "pitch" because I did stand on the mound and I did throw the ball in the direction of the batter.  Henry Rowengartner I was not, and there was no Rookie of the Year awards in my future.

After ninth grade, I picked up the sport of lacrosse and left baseball behind.  It wasn't that I was particularly better at lacrosse (I wasn't).  I just thought it looked cool.  But because the mechanics behind throwing a lacrosse ball and a baseball are entirely different, it's easy to believe that in the nearly 15 years since I had played, my skills on the diamond had diminished completely. Before today, I really couldn't say when the last time was that I actually threw a baseball.

So it was with trepidation that I asked Joe Cristy to show me something that I hadn't learned in my Little League days.  Today, I asked him to show me how to throw a curveball.

Of course, I was throwing it at a much slower speed and at a closer distance than anyone in the pros, which makes what they do all the more impressive.  With that being said, for my first time trying this, I thought it came out pretty well!

Joe said that my arm release made it better for me to throw a slider, which is a similar movement type of pitch.  He said that people are basically built to throw different pitches based on how their tendons and their muscles are aligned, and that throwing outside of your comfort zone is what causes real damage.  Based on how sore my arm felt afterwards, I think it's safe to say that I am not built to throw the curve.

That being said, I think that pitches like this reaffirm my love of the guys on the mound that throw junk.  Yes, fastballs are impressive, and the Nuke Lalooshes of the world have their place.  But it's the finesse guys that make things interesting.  The slider, the cutter, and yes, the curveball, help to make the game an artform.