R.A. Dickey throwing another knockler. Photo via wiki/flickr user dbking
A few months ago I posted a Youtube video showing a Catcher’s point-of-view look at R.A. Dickey‘s knuckle ball coming in.
Here’s a couple more cool graphics that have popped up on various blogs that I read.
- From imgur/r/baseball, an animated Gif of Dickey’s knuckler as it travels to the plate. Done by the same fellow @DShep25 who did similar Gifs of Yu Darvish‘s repertoire and of Miguel Cabrera‘s ability to hit homers from any point in terms of plate coverage. (h/t to BusinessInsider blog).
- And here’s a story to go with the above images from the author himself, Drew Shephard on fangraphs.com.
Still amazing that his 2013 numbers are so bad right now (6-8, 4.90 ERA, 1.388 whip, all significantly worse than his Cy Young numbers from last year). The Blue Jays are only 6-9 in his starts, a big reason why they’re in last place in the AL East right now.
And then, since its related to these cool graphics, here’s a study (again from BusinessInsider’s Sports blog) about the Physics of a Curve Ball. Its no wonder Dickey reportedly didn’t even travel with the team when they went to Colorado; he knew his pitches wouldn’t have any movement.