Just Watched last nights game.

[Bulldog Bruce]

It is so hard for me to believe these pitch velocities. If you could throw a 96 mph fastball in 1980, you threw it 85% of the time. It was definitely your out pitch. This LSU kid threw so many off speed pitches. He does have a good change, but Tom Seaver/ Nolan Ryan/ Jacob DeGrom/ Noah Syndergaard is going to throw a fastball when it is time to get you out. In 1980 Neal Heaton @ Miami was the top pitcher in D1 Baseball and he threw almost nothing but fastballs. I played with and against him since I was 14 and he was the fastest pitcher I ever faced and he would throw 97 maybe 98 on the guns of the day. In college he could just overpower hitters. I don't know if I can believe that 96 no longer can overpower hitters. Actually I don't think todays 96 = yesterdays 96.

 

[Willow Grove Dawg]

This guy knows!

 

[dog12]

It is so hard for me to believe these pitch velocities. If you could throw a 96 mph fastball in 1980, you threw it 85% of the time. It was definitely your out pitch. This LSU kid threw so many off speed pitches. He does have a good change, but Tom Seaver/ Nolan Ryan/ Jacob DeGrom/ Noah Syndergaard is going to throw a fastball when it is time to get you out. In 1980 Neal Heaton @ Miami was the top pitcher in D1 Baseball and he threw almost nothing but fastballs. I played with and against him since I was 14 and he was the fastest pitcher I ever faced and he would throw 97 maybe 98 on the guns of the day. In college he could just overpower hitters. I don't know if I can believe that 96 no longer can overpower hitters. Actually I don't think todays 96 = yesterdays 96.

Agree. The radar guns used today seem to add a few MPH.

However, (most of) today's hitters have very different swing mechanics than we had years ago, and those mechanics enable today's hitters to more easily get the bat on the ball with more bat speed at the point of contact.

A few years ago, I started doing some research on hitting when my daughter said she wanted to start playing softball.

In my opinion, based upon my research, a guy named Matt Antonelli is teaching the best swing mechanics. He has lots of videos on hitting. The following is a great video from him that essentially explains the swing mechanics he teaches.

 

[Willowdawg]

I get what you're saying, but it's bc more kids are throwing in the 90s than back then. Just about every college team has one guy throwing mid 90s. I'll take a slower fastball with movement on it any day of the week. But like you said, you gotta know when to throw it but that's pitching 101.

 

[Bulldog Bruce]

Nobody has reinvented hitting. All the mechanics taught now were taught then.

There was as documentary a few years back on Netflix called Fastball. It said that today's gun measures ball speed out of the pitchers hand and the old ones the measurement was 5 or 10 feet in front of the plate. So Nolan Ryan's 100 reading back then would be 108 now. I think that is right.

 

[bruiser.sixpack]

I don’t know for sure because I haven’t looked back. But it seems today by the time a pitcher releases his pitch he is only about 52 feet from the plate, so I wonder if that is why the gun register it at 95-96, when 40 years ago when Bruce played, the pitchers tended to hang on the the Rubber longer before they released the ball. I have seen some guys that are finished off the hill after their release. That is a ridiculous stride.

 

[MagnoliaHunter]

difference in the radar guns

I have a buddy who's uncle is a mlb scout and he said his uncle told him that the new radar guns read the velocity closer to the pitcher and the old ones read it closer to the plate. I've heard mlb announcers say this too.

 

[JacksonDevilDog]

Players are in better shape and strength training begins earlier for them. Proper nutrition is also more commonly known. Most players didn't lift weights back in the 80's.

 

[Bulldog Bruce]

None of that is right. We had all that in the 80s. We had the athletes only cafeteria and a few weight rooms. We had required weight training in the periods where we couldn't practice.

Now I will say College Baseball players are bigger now than back in the 80s. I was big at 6'1" 215. There definitely seems to be many more players bigger than that these days.