View Full Version : How fast did a pitcher throw back in the day?
AutographCollector
10-16-2006, 10:46 PM
With no radar guns back then (back then being when the first teams came to be) I am just curious how fast did the pitchers throw back then? 90 mph? Faster? Slower? Much slower? Is there a way to find out? :noidea
Buzzaldrin
10-17-2006, 10:43 AM
Tough question because of pitching distances. If a guy like Amos Rusie, who I'm guessing could probably get somewhere up in the low 90s (and I'm guessing that because he was the fastest of his era, but I still doubt he could hit 95) at 60'6", how much faster would that have been at 50 feet before 1893? Even an 80 MPH pitch is gonna have a bunch more heat from 10 feet (or 15 feet a decade earlier) closer. Look at league batting averages from the mid and late 1880s- the only other time in baseball history they were as low was during the heart of the dead ball era and the 1960s. All restrictions on pitching delivery had been abolished and the plate was only 50 feet away- the ball had to be going awful fast.
TonyK
10-17-2006, 12:48 PM
One incident in a minor league game of the 1890's shows me they were throwing hard...the batter was hit by the pitch somewhere in the head. He lay unconscious on the ground for several minutes. His teammates poured water from the team water jug on him to revive him. He played the next day.
Hammerin Hank
10-17-2006, 12:54 PM
One incident in a minor league game of the 1890's shows me they were throwing hard...the batter was hit by the pitch somewhere in the head. He lay unconscious on the ground for several minutes. His teammates poured water from the team water jug on him to revive him. He played the next day.
Softer ball back then too, wasn't it?
TonyK
10-17-2006, 01:18 PM
Softer ball back then too, wasn't it?
I think the ball was changed from year to year, and each minor league chose the ball they wanted to use before the season started. I doubt this ball was soft.
AutographCollector
10-18-2006, 12:11 AM
They had a minor league system back in the 1890's? :confused:
milladrive
10-18-2006, 01:41 AM
I'm pretty sure the minor leagues was a 20th Century Branch Rickey development.
Buzzaldrin
10-18-2006, 02:41 AM
I'm pretty sure the minor leagues was a 20th Century Branch Rickey development.
Then you're pretty wrong- there were minor leagues all the way back to the 1870s.
Hammerin Hank
10-18-2006, 11:03 AM
Major is an antonym of minor. Why would they name it the Major Leagues if there weren't any minor leagues?
milladrive
10-18-2006, 03:03 PM
Then you're pretty wrong- there were minor leagues all the way back to the 1870s.
Yup, you're right. My statement shouldn't have been so simplistic.