The physics of throwing a perfect baseball pitch

Popular Science (Oct. 4) -- A Major League Baseball pitcher has 60 feet and 6 inches of air to get each pitch to sizzle before it crosses the plate. But it’s their arsenal of throws that separates a good pitcher from a great one. Two-fingered fastball, four-fingered fastball, slider, curve, cutter, knuckleball – each option spins differently to achieve a unique motion. “There are a lot of tools that the pitcher has at his disposal,” says Alan Nathan, a a professor emeritus of physicist at Illinois. “I think the primary things that play a role are the speed, the spin rate and the spin axis.”