WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- The boys of summer are here. Whether you're a sports fanatic with season tickets or have a kid in little league -- there's a lot more to baseball then hitting homeruns.
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From the crack of a bat, to the perfect pitch … there's a lot of skill and technique that goes into baseball. But for some players, what they see is not always what's happening. Howard Zelaznik, Ph.D., a kinesiologist at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., says a fastball pitch can play tricks on a batter's mind.
From the crack of a bat, to the perfect pitch … there's a lot of skill and technique that goes into baseball. But for some players, what they see is not always what's happening. Howard Zelaznik, Ph.D., a kinesiologist at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., says a fastball pitch can play tricks on a batter's mind.
When a pitcher throws a ball -- whether it's a fastball or not -- the batter usually underestimates its speed and misjudges where the ball and bat will collide after the pitch. The batter must take his eye off the ball to predict where the bat will hit the ball. When the ball comes back into view, it's higher than he thought.
"This error is bigger for the faster the pitch, and that's why very fast fastballs have this illusion of it rising," Dr. Zelaznik said.
Another pitch that throws batters for a loop is the curveball.
"The curveball has a spin to it, so let's imagine the ball is spinning clockwise as a right-hander," Dr. Zelaznik said.
As the ball spins, the air moves faster on the side of the ball going in the direction of the air and slower on the side that is spinning against the air. Therefore, one side has less pressure than the other side, pushing the ball to one side and causing it to curve.
In the major leagues, a curveball can veer as much as 17.5 inches by the time it crosses the plate.
From the big leagues to the minors, science and baseball are a hit.
The American Association of Physics Teachers contributed to the information contained in the TV portion of this report.
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