Do riseballs rise? 3Q2011 Edition

FiveFrameSwing · Sep 3, 2011

Hal, post a video of the baseball pitch you want discussed and I’ll discuss it.

In the mean time, you’ve been asked by multiple people to supply a video supporting your assertion that a riseball contains late upward break. You’ll of course refuse to comply with that request, because there is no video that supports your assertion.

I don’t know of anyone taking sentences out of context. But along a similar line, what do you think of people that spread false assertions? Let’s face it, you’ve been in this business for a while, and by now you likely know the truth, yet you wish to propagate something that isn’t true. Why?

FiveFrameSwing · Sep 3, 2011

Hal, if you truly respect the topic of pitching, then please take the time to review & study video.

When you find that your available videos don't support your beliefs, then take the next step and have your favorite pitchers throw riseballs.

When you find that you are unable to collect video that supports your beliefs, then accept the evidence and refine your teachings.

I myself went to see Bill Hillhouse throw his riseball … and while Bill threw a superb riseball, his riseball did not have a late upwards break. At Bill’s recommendation I visited Mike White … I ended up seeing Mike throw hundreds of riseballs, and not a single one of Mike’s riseballs contained a late upwards break. I visited Kirk Walker who showed me his video stash which he believed included evidence supporting his belief that a riseball had late upward breaking action, and when I analyzed his videos I learned that Kirk was incorrect, and that his video evidence actually supported the notion that a riseball does not have a late upward break. I visited others. My point is, I truly tried to collect data that would support the notion that you are trying to propagate, but everything came back the same … and the conclusion was that a riseball is merely an anti-drop ball that does not have a late upwards break.

Please, respect this activity enough to conduct some basic research. It really isn’t a lot to ask. I’ve done it … and I suspect you are more heavily invested than I am.

curiousgeorge · Sep 3, 2011

all due respect Five, I can probably guarantee Hillhouse or White did not throw full speed. I am no expert but I"m sure that matters. Walker couldn't demonstrate this if he had to.

FiveFrameSwing · Sep 3, 2011

curiousgeorge said:
all due respect Five, I can probably guarantee Hillhouse or White did not throw full speed. I am no expert but I"m sure that matters. Walker couldn't demonstrate this if he had to.

I've seen Mike throw in games, demonstrations, pitching practices, pitching lessons, pitching BP ... even caught him ... he's good ... he's extremely good ... but his riseball does not contain a late upwards break.

Kirk had a large stash of pitching videos that he was excited to show me ... almost like a little kid in a candy store ... his juices truly get flowing when he's talking about the specifics of pitching. He showed me his videos supported the belief that a riseball contains a late upwards break ... and he had many such videos ... but sadly, he was seeing what he wanted to see, and slowing the videos down for analysis showed that there was no late upwards break.

Visited Nancy Evans in AZ ... dido, no late upwards break on her riseball.

Visited others ... sincerely tried to find evidence of a riseball with a late upward break.

Let's face it ... if people like Bill Hillhouse, Mike White, Doug Gillis, and others, ... can't demonstrate a riseball with a late upwards break, then it's safe to assume that it's a questionable goal ...... but if you have some video evidence of a riseball with late upwards break, then I'd appreciate you posting it.

halskinner · Sep 3, 2011

FiveFrameSwing said:
Hal, if you truly respect the topic of pitching, then please take the time to review & study video.

When you find that your available videos don't support your beliefs, then take the next step and have your favorite pitchers throw riseballs.

When you find that you are unable to collect video that supports your beliefs, then accept the evidence and refine your teachings.

I myself went to see Bill Hillhouse throw his riseball … and while Bill threw a superb riseball, his riseball did not have a late upwards break. At Bill’s recommendation I visited Mike White … I ended up seeing Mike throw hundreds of riseballs, and not a single one of Mike’s riseballs contained a late upwards break. I visited Kirk Walker who showed me his video stash which he believed included evidence supporting his belief that a riseball had late upward breaking action, and when I analyzed his videos I learned that Kirk was incorrect, and that his video evidence actually supported the notion that a riseball does not have a late upward break. I visited others. My point is, I truly tried to collect data that would support the notion that you are trying to propagate, but everything came back the same … and the conclusion was that a riseball is merely an anti-drop ball that does not have a late upwards break.

Please, respect this activity enough to conduct some basic research. It really isn’t a lot to ask. I’ve done it … and I suspect you are more heavily invested than I am.

I just posed that querry to a few guys I know in MLB. Whether they can let me have a video to post, not sure, the broadcasts are the property of MLB. I also asked them for an opinion if the Submarine pitchers riseballs really rise. One of them was a pitcher and the other was a catcher.

For everyone else viewing this, watch your favorite MLB team and watch for a 'Submarine' pitcher. You will know them when you see them. They are the ones that appear to throw the ball underhanded and they are the ONLY ones that can throw a risenall.

FiveFrameSwing · Sep 4, 2011

halskinner said:
I just posed that querry to a few guys I know in MLB. Whether they can let me have a video to post, not sure, the broadcasts are the property of MLB. I also asked them for an opinion if the Submarine pitchers riseballs really rise. One of them was a pitcher and the other was a catcher.

For everyone else viewing this, watch your favorite MLB team and watch for a 'Submarine' pitcher. You will know them when you see them. They are the ones that appear to throw the ball underhanded and they are the ONLY ones that can throw a risenall.

Hal, I visited "The Official Site of Major League Baseball" (MLB.com) and reviewed videos of Brad Ziegler's submarine pitches ... not a one of his pitches had a late upward break.

While you continue to divert from the topic at hand, don't forget to post some examples of windmill pitchers throwing riseballs with late upward breaking action ... something you, or anyone else, have yet done. Again ... I'm not asking for a lot ... you've made a claim that a riseball has a late upward break, but you have yet supported that claim with any data.

As for commentator comments ... that's worth next to zilch. Anyone listening to such comments without verifying the information is being careless.

For example, I like Michelle Smith ... I think she has made some excellent contributions to the sport ... but when you listen to her commentate, it's clear that she gets a lot wrong ... including the riseball myth. Thanks to the introduction of the K-Zone this year, Michelle was forced to stymie her usual comments on the riseball myth ... as the K-Zone displays would have made her look utterly silly if she continued to spill forth her usual nonsense.

Please ... post video ... not your recollection of what a commentator said.

Don't you find it a bit odd that you've been advocating a late upward break of a riseball, yet you don't have a single shred of data to support it? Not a single shred of evidence ... that should have you scratching your head ... it certainly has me scratching mine.

halskinner · Sep 4, 2011

FiveFrameSwing said:
Hal, I visited "The Official Site of Major League Baseball" (MLB.com) and reviewed videos of Brad Ziegler's submarine pitches ... not a one of his pitches had a late upward break.

While you continue to divert from the topic at hand, don't forget to post some examples of windmill pitchers throwing riseballs with late upward breaking action ... something you, or anyone else, have yet done. Again ... I'm not asking for a lot ... you've made a claim that a riseball has a late upward break, but you have yet supported that claim with any data.

As for commentator comments ... that's worth next to zilch. Anyone listening to such comments without verifying the information is being careless.

For example, I like Michelle Smith ... I think she has made some excellent contributions to the sport ... but when you listen to her commentate, it's clear that she gets a lot wrong ... including the riseball myth. Thanks to the introduction of the K-Zone this year, Michelle was forced to stymie her usual comments on the riseball myth ... as the K-Zone displays would have made her look utterly silly if she continued to spill forth her usual nonsense.

Please ... post video ... not your recollection of what a commentator said.

Don't you find it a bit odd that you've been advocating a late upward break of a riseball, yet you don't have a single shred of data to support it? Not a single shred of evidence ... that should have you scratching your head ... it certainly has me scratching mine.

Thanks for the link. Just watched it and none of those three pitches were riseballs, the commentators would have said it. It looked like 2 fastballs and one cutter(?) I found videos of 4 other submarine pitchers on the site but none were throwing a riseball either.

I cant provide a video of any od my students except the one with 10 year old. Onxe every month I would vide3tape a student the first 10 minutes or so. We spent the rest of the 30 minutes going over it. The next student arrixes and that tape (VHS) was re-wound and recorded over.

I always had my own camera there too as sometimes another of the instructors was using the academies VHS for their students. My camera was an older one that used floppies, 15 seciond videos. The vast majority of those were given to the parent to review with their kid at home. I did have a hndful of riseball videos that were lost on a hardrive that crashed several years ago. I found a few on an old zip discs, including the one on this thread, the only one of any of my students throwing a bent fingered riseball.

Oh well. Think whatever you want.

FiveFrameSwing · Sep 4, 2011

I understand Hal, you can't produce a video of a riseball with a late upward break ... but that's okay, because nobody else can either.

Sparky Guy · Sep 5, 2011

The whole "Does the rise ball really rise?" argument has been done before many, many times. Here's my take on the whole thing. My DD has/had a great rise from the time she was 14 all the way through college. I honestly thought the ball jumped as well. After reading some of the things about baseball physics I have come to the conclusion the ball does not rise. The pitch fools the brain.

There is no science to back this up. It is my own theory as to why the pitch works so well. So here goes.

1) We have lived on this planet our entire lives. We are all subject to the force of gravity. Out brains make the necessary adjustments for the speed of gravity. The brain in it's amazing functions anticipates things. Every thrown object falls back to earth in an arc determined by the force and angle applied to the object. The brain does all the math automatically to determine where the ball will land.

2) The number of RPM's needed to achieve actual lift on a ball is far greater than humanly possible.

3) We tend to believe what our brains and eyes think they see.

4) Watched a video of a NASA experiment a long time ago. They placed a subject in a centrifuge and spun them up to about 4 g's for a few minutes. During this time the subject was to reach out and touch a spot that was placed on the panel in front of them numerous times. After a few attempts the subjects were able to do it repeatedly. They stopped the centrifuge and told the subject to touch the spot. All of them missed the first few times they tried because their brain had adjusted for the additional G force.

What I feel happens is a well thrown rise ball does not rise but actually falls slower than the speed of gravity. The brain is anticipating the ball falling at the speed of gravity. When it does not see the ball descend it appears as if the ball jumps/hops upwards. The brain makes the calculations of where it thinks the ball will be and lets the body swing the bat to that point which actually slightly lower than the actual path of the ball flight.

I doubt anyone would actually spend the money trying to prove it. But it's the best reason I can come with. The pitch fools the brain by falling slightly less than the speed of gravity.

Chris O'Leary · Sep 5, 2011

Sparky Guy said:
The whole "Does the rise ball really rise?" argument has been done before many, many times. Here's my take on the whole thing. My DD has/had a great rise from the time she was 14 all the way through college. I honestly thought the ball jumped as well. After reading some of the things about baseball physics I have come to the conclusion the ball does not rise. The pitch fools the brain.

There is no science to back this up. It is my own theory as to why the pitch works so well. So here goes.

1) We have lived on this planet our entire lives. We are all subject to the force of gravity. Out brains make the necessary adjustments for the speed of gravity. The brain in it's amazing functions anticipates things. Every thrown object falls back to earth in an arc determined by the force and angle applied to the object. The brain does all the math automatically to determine where the ball will land.

2) The number of RPM's needed to achieve actual lift on a ball is far greater than humanly possible.

3) We tend to believe what our brains and eyes think they see.

4) Watched a video of a NASA experiment a long time ago. They placed a subject in a centrifuge and spun them up to about 4 g's for a few minutes. During this time the subject was to reach out and touch a spot that was placed on the panel in front of them numerous times. After a few attempts the subjects were able to do it repeatedly. They stopped the centrifuge and told the subject to touch the spot. All of them missed the first few times they tried because their brain had adjusted for the additional G force.

What I feel happens is a well thrown rise ball does not rise but actually falls slower than the speed of gravity. The brain is anticipating the ball falling at the speed of gravity. When it does not see the ball descend it appears as if the ball jumps/hops upwards. The brain makes the calculations of where it thinks the ball will be and lets the body swing the bat to that point which actually slightly lower than the actual path of the ball flight.

I doubt anyone would actually spend the money trying to prove it. But it's the best reason I can come with. The pitch fools the brain by falling slightly less than the speed of gravity.

Rise balls don't rise.

For the reasons you state above, it may seem to, but that's an optical illusion.

There's also the issue that the brain has trouble processing purely vertical movement (because of how the eyes are oriented horizontally).

That probably contributes to the illusion.

Do riseballs rise? 3Q2011 Edition

Welcome to Discuss Fastpitch

Your FREE Account is waiting to the Best Softball Community on the Web.

FiveFrameSwing

Banned

FiveFrameSwing

Banned

curiousgeorge

FiveFrameSwing

Banned

halskinner

Banned

FiveFrameSwing

Banned

halskinner

Banned

FiveFrameSwing

Banned

Sparky Guy

Chris O'Leary

Similar threads

Latest posts

Members online

Forum statistics

Share this page

Online statistics

Forum statistics