| They say that good pitching stops good hitting. | | | | a pitcher can try two approaches. One of them |
| But what makes a good pitcher besides how hard | | | | involves throwing pitches on the outside of the |
| he throws. If you ask Tom Glavin, who doesn't | | | | plate. This way, if the batter tries to pull the pitch |
| throw hard enough to knock a tin can off of a | | | | he's only going to manage to hit the ball to the |
| shaky bar stool, he'll tell you that it's all in the | | | | shortstop all day long. He'll almost never get a hit |
| approach. And a lot of that has to do with | | | | because he's not going with the pitch the other |
| knowing your hitter.In a situation where there is | | | | way. Another approach is to jam the batter or |
| nobody on base, the pitcher deals with each | | | | throw the ball inside. If the batter pulls these |
| batter one on one with very little regard to | | | | pitches he's only going to end up hitting them |
| anything else, with some exceptions which we'll | | | | foul.Let's say a batter is a great low ball hitter, |
| get to later. In a normal situation the pitcher has | | | | regardless of whether the pitch is a slow curve, |
| to go over the batter's strengths and | | | | split finger or even hard fastball. Against these |
| weaknesses, which he will get from the team | | | | type of hitters the pitcher will want to keep the |
| scouting reports that they go over before the | | | | ball up, which is usually not a good thing. In this |
| game. There is no such thing as the perfect hitter. | | | | case, it probably is. Most likely low ball hitters have |
| Everyone has at least one weakness. It is the | | | | an uppercut swing to get the ball into the air, like |
| pitcher's job to try to exploit that weakness.For | | | | Jeremy Burnitz. If you throw these batter balls up |
| example and let's make this a simple one, let's say | | | | in the strike zone, most likely they will swing |
| a batter is a dead fastball hitter. In other words it | | | | under the ball and either pop it up or swing and |
| is very difficult to get him out by throwing a | | | | miss it completely.These are just a few of the |
| fastball by him. However, he has a lot of trouble | | | | many different situations and batters that a |
| with a curveball. In this case, the pitcher will use | | | | pitcher is going to have to deal with not only day |
| mostly his curveball to throw strikes and when he | | | | to day but batter to batter. It is a constant |
| does throw a fastball he will only throw it to | | | | psychological war against the opposing hitter. The |
| "show" the batter the pitch, meaning that he will | | | | pitchers who are able to adjust to this war of |
| throw it out of the strike zone so the batter can't | | | | nerves are the ones who go on to have hall of |
| hit it.In another example, let's say a batter is a | | | | fame careers. |
| dead pull hitter. When pitching to someone like this | | | | |