Quote:
Originally Posted by
SField 
Question for the baseball guys RE: the spit ball I remember in that series between the Marlins and the Indians when it went up to Cleveland in that cold weather, everyone was talking about Herschiser vs Hernandez, and Orel's licking of his fingers before throwing a pitch. What was the deal with that?
Could just be about warming his hand, or getting a better feel for the grip.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Stylish Pilot Spitball just allows yu to get more grip on the baseball. .
The opposite, actually. How would putting lube on the ball give you more grip? The idea of a true spitball is to reduce the friction between your fingers and the ball. Gaylord Perry's book, among others, gives a pretty good description. If you've ever thrown a forkball, it's somewhat similar. With a forkball, you're pushing off with your thumb on the bottom of the ball to reduce the topspin. With a spitter, reducing the drag from your fingers on top of the ball has the same effect. As slopho points out, once could also use foreign substances to the same effect as scuffing or cutting the ball -- to make the surface of the ball more irregular, thereby effecting the rotation and the Bernoulli effect.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
NH_Clark also, there was a comment about a kunckler trying to get a spin on the ball. I don't think that's right. I thought they were going for zero rotation on the ball since that could disrupt the "unpredictability" of the ball?
I don't claim to be an expert, but what I always heard and what my very limited experience seems to support is that a very small amount of spin is more effective than zero spin. This still means virtually "no spin" compared to a pitch thrown normally. Some explanations I've read say that if you have a bit of spin, you have a bit more control over which way the ball will break (it's influenced by the direction of the spin).
