Screwball

[MikeP]

I throw up in my mouth everytime this "pitch" is talked about. The screwball, not to be out done by his older brother the "rise screw" and little brother, "drop screw". Pretty soon ESPN's 2 time Olympic Gold Medalist commentator will invent the "backdoor screw" (if it hasn't been invented already). And those parents who actually believe their kid has 8 pitches at 10 yrs old? These are the same nutjobs that will make the post game dinner depend on a win or loss. A win gets you steak somewhere, a loss you get Spaghetti O's. I'd almost rather have Casey Anthony for a parent instead!

DD's team from last year had a pitcher who's dad was an assistant and his daughter was the #1 pitcher for the team. He always called curve and screwball, this was 10u mind you, so I finally asked dd what the pitch did when she was catching her. She said her curve is an outside fastball and her screwball is an inside fastball

 

[uncdrew]

DD's team from last year had a pitcher who's dad was an assistant and his daughter was the #1 pitcher for the team. He always called curve and screwball, this was 10u mind you, so I finally asked dd what the pitch did when she was catching her. She said her curve is an outside fastball and her screwball is an inside fastball

My daughter caught for a girl with 5 pitches. 12U. The coach knew she didn't have 5 pitches, but called them anyway to humor the girl and dad. My DD caught for her one time and asked me "Why are all 5 of her pitches the exact same?"

 

[uncdrew]

... and I almost saw the lightbulb go off when my other DD pitched to the dad and threw a change-up that was significantly slower than her fastball. He said "wow, that's a lot slower".

 

[625ender]

Caught millions of pitches and I've never seen a legit screwball from a man, woman, or child

 

[ANNASDAD]

I'd almost rather have Casey Anthony for a parent instead!

Shut her down, quote of the day!!

 

[schwabach]

Caught millions of pitches and I've never seen a legit screwball from a man, woman, or child

You've never seen a pitch breaking opposite direction from a curve?

 

[625ender]

You've never seen a pitch breaking opposite direction from a curve?

I've seen a pile of cutters and two seam fastballs breaking throw hand side. Never a screwball. It's hard to get enough revs and the abgle to make that happen. Ive seen pitching machines do it

 

[radness]

Drop spin with a twist can break both ways.

 

[Sweet Lou]

Caught millions of pitches and I've never seen a legit screwball from a man, woman, or child

It's a very difficult pitch to throw and even more difficult to throw well. And given that a even a good screw ball has less break that most average curve balls and is generally pretty taxing on the arm given the way you need to force the elbow it's not surprising you haven't seen one.

I think in the history of MLB there have been less than 3 dozen MLB pitchers who threw a screwball with any regilarity and that's out of literatlly thousands of MLB pitchers. The last really good one I recall was Fernado Valezuela. Hector Santigao is the last one I recall in MLB who threw a screwball somewhat regularly.

But if you want a see a pretty good one here is Oliver drake throwing one, he's currently with the Rays but not sure how often he throws the pitch to be honest. But if this isn't a screwball I'm not sure what it is

That said I've never personally caught a girl in SB who could throw a screw ball but then I've never had one claim to me that they could either.

 

[625ender]

It's a very difficult pitch to throw and even more difficult to throw well. And given that a even a good screw ball has less break that most average curve balls and is generally pretty taxing on the arm given the way you need to force the elbow it's not surprising you haven't seen one.

I think in the history of MLB there have been less than 3 dozen MLB pitchers who threw a screwball with any regilarity and that's out of literatlly thousands of MLB pitchers. The last really good one I recall was Fernado Valezuela. Hector Santigao is the last one I recall in MLB who threw a screwball somewhat regularly.

But if you want a see a pretty good one here is Oliver drake throwing one, he's currently with the Rays but not sure how often he throws the pitch to be honest. But if this isn't a screwball I'm not sure what it is

That said I've never personally caught a girl in SB who could throw a screw ball but then I've never had one claim to me that they could either.

I'm not familiar with this pitcher. Its tough to tell from your clip, but it looks like a split finger fastball off the left side of the rubber