Ruston, LA - On Sunday, September 1, 2024, the Prep Baseball Louisiana staff traveled to Louisiana Tech, to host our first event of the fall with our North Louisiana Fall ID.  Each participant went through a pro-style workout that consisted of running a laser-timed 60 yard dash using Swift Performance, defensive evaluations, batting practice using Trackman Baseball and Blast Motion, and the pitchers finished the event off by throwing bullpens with Trackman Baseball.  Below, we take a look at some of the top pitching metrics across different categories from Sunday.  

VIEW ALL EVENT STATS HERE.

MAX FASTBALL & AVERAGE SPIN RATE

Max Fastball Velocity: This metric calculates the speed of the pitch as it’s released from the pitcher’s hand.

Spin Rate: This metric calculates the rate of spin on the baseball as it leaves the pitcher’s hand, measured in revolutions per minute (rpm). Historical data shows that high-spin fastballs lessen the impact of gravity, allowing for more ‘rise’ (or less fall, in other words) as it carries through the zone. Low-spin fastballs typically indicate the pitch has greater horizontal action, often making it tougher to square up, but generally easier to make contact with, leading to more ground balls, while high-spin fastballs show a correlation with swings and misses.

 

AVERAGE FASTBALL HORIZONTAL MOVEMENT

Horizontal Break: Outlined on TrackMan’s own website: “... horizontal movement is measured in inches between where the pitch actually crosses the front of home plate side-wise, and where it would have crossed home plate side-wise if had it traveled in a perfectly straight line from release. A positive number means the break was to the right from the pitcher’s perspective, while a negative number means the break was to the left from the pitcher’s perspective.”

AVERAGE FASTBALL INDUCED VERTICAL BREAK

Induced Vertical Break: IVB simply means the pitch is "breaking" upward from the average level a pitch falls from release to home plate.  The higher the number, the more "rise" the pitch has compared to average. 

AVERAGE SLIDER SPIN RATE

Spin Rate: The metric calculates how fast the ball is spinning as it leaves the pitcher’s hand, reported in the number of times the pitched ball would spin per minute (“revolutions per minute” or “rpm”).

 

AVERAGE CURVEBALL SPIN RATE
 

Spin Rate: The metric calculates how fast the ball is spinning as it leaves the pitcher’s hand, reported in the number of times the pitched ball would spin per minute (“revolutions per minute” or “rpm”).

 

AVERAGE CHANGEUP HORIZONTAL MOVEMENT

Horizontal Break: This metric measures the distance, measured in inches, between where the pitch actually crosses the front of home plate side-wise, and where it would have crossed home plate side-wise if had it traveled in a perfectly straight line from release. A positive number means the break was to the right from the pitcher’s perspective, while a negative number means the break was to the left from the pitcher’s perspective.

 

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