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Screwball
A screwball is a baseball and fastpitch softball pitch that is thrown so as to break in the opposite direction of a slider or curveball. Depending on the pitcher's arm angle, the ball may also have a sinking action. The pitch is sometimes known as the scroogie or airbender. Carl Hubbell was one of the most renowned screwball pitchers in the history of Major League Baseball. Hubbell was known as the "scroogie king" for his mastery of the pitch and the frequency with which he threw it. Other famous screwball hurlers include Tug McGraw, inaugural Hall of Fame member Christy Mathewson, and Cy Young Award winners Mike Cuellar, Fernando Valenzuela, Mike Marshall, and Willie Hernández. Grip and action The baseball is held with the open end of the horseshoe shape (where the seams are closest together) facing upward. The thumb is placed just beneath the bottom of the horseshoe, the index finger is curled against the top of the thumb, forming a tight circle to the side of the ball. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fernando Valenzuela
Fernando Valenzuela Anguamea (; November 1, 1960 – October 22, 2024), nicknamed "El Toro", was a Mexican professional baseball pitcher. Valenzuela played 17 Major League Baseball (MLB) seasons, from 1980 to 1997 (except for a one-year sabbatical in Mexico in 1992). He played for six MLB teams, most prominently with the Los Angeles Dodgers, who signed him in 1979 and gave him his MLB debut in 1980. Valenzuela batted and threw left-handed, with an unorthodox windup. He was one of a small number of pitchers who regularly threw a screwball in the modern era. Valenzuela enjoyed his breakout year in 1981, when "Fernandomania" rapidly catapulted him from relative obscurity to stardom. He won his first eight games started, starts, five of them shutout (baseball), shutouts, and finished with a win–loss record of 13–7 and had a 2.48 earned run average (ERA) in a season that was shortened by 1981 Major League Baseball strike, a player's strike. He became the first, and as of 2024, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tug McGraw
Frank Edwin "Tug" McGraw Jr. (August 30, 1944 – January 5, 2004) was an American professional baseball relief pitcher. McGraw played in 19 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB), from 1965 to 1984, for the New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies, earning over $2 million. He is often remembered for coining the phrase "Ya Gotta Believe", which became the rallying cry for the 1973 New York Mets and has since become a popular slogan for the team and fans. McGraw struck out Willie Wilson to end the 1980 World Series against the Kansas City Royals, bringing the Philadelphia Phillies their first World Series championship in franchise history. McGraw was one of six Phillies players to die prematurely from glioblastoma, a brain cancer. Although it cannot be proven, a hypothesis links the cancer to toxic PFAS chemicals in the AstroTurf at Veterans Stadium. Early life Frank Edwin "Tug" McGraw Jr. was born August 30, 1944, in Martinez, California, the second of three sons of Frank Ed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pitch (baseball)
In baseball, the pitch is the act of throwing the baseball toward home plate to start a play. The term comes from the Knickerbocker Rules. Originally, the ball had to be thrown underhand, much like "pitching in horseshoes". Overhand pitching was not allowed in baseball until 1884. The biomechanics of pitching have been studied extensively. The phases of pitching include the windup, early cocking, late cocking, early acceleration, late acceleration, deceleration, and follow-through. Pitchers throw a variety of pitches, each of which has a slightly different velocity, trajectory, movement, hand position, wrist position and/or arm angle. These variations are introduced to confuse the batter and ultimately aid the defensive team in getting the batter or baserunners out. To obtain variety, and therefore enhance defensive baseball strategy, the pitcher manipulates the grip on the ball at the point of release. Variations in the grip cause the seams to catch the air differently, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Willie Hernández
Guillermo "Willie" Hernández Villanueva (November 14, 1954 – November 20, 2023) was a Puerto Rican baseball relief pitcher in Major League Baseball. He won both the American League Cy Young Award and the American League Most Valuable Player Award in 1984 after leading the Detroit Tigers to the World Series championship. Hernández was born and raised in Aguada, Puerto Rico. He signed with the Philadelphia Phillies in 1973 and played in their minor-league system as a starting pitcher from 1974 to 1976. He was acquired by the Chicago Cubs in the 1976 Rule 5 Draft and played for the Cubs, principally as a relief pitcher, from 1977 to 1983. His performance improved markedly after adding a screwball and cut fastball to his pitching repertoire. He was traded to the Phillies in May 1983, helped lead them to the National League pennant, and appeared in three games in the 1983 World Series, giving up zero hits and zero runs in three games. In March 1984, he was traded to the Detroi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch (baseball), plays, with each play beginning when a player on the fielding team (baseball), fielding team, called the pitcher, throws a Baseball (ball), ball that a player on the batting team (baseball), batting team, called the Batter (baseball), batter, tries to hit with a baseball bat, bat. The objective of the offensive team (batting team) is to hit the ball into the field of play, away from the other team's players, allowing its players to run the Base (baseball), bases, having them advance counter-clockwise around four bases to score what are called "Run (baseball), runs". The objective of the defensive team (referred to as the fielding team) is to prevent batters from becoming Base running, runners, and to prevent runners base running ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harry Brecheen
Harry David Brecheen (, , October 14, 1914 – January 17, 2004), nicknamed "the Cat", was an American left-handed pitcher in Major League Baseball who played most of his career for the St. Louis Cardinals. In the late 1940s, he was among the team's stars, in 1946 becoming the first left-hander ever to win three games in a single World Series, and the only pitcher ever to win consecutive World Series games. He later led the National League in several categories in 1948. Bracheen's career World Series earned run average of 0.83 was a major league record from 1946 to 1976. From 1951 to 1971, he held the Cardinals' franchise record for career strikeouts by a left-hander, and he also retired with the fourth-highest fielding percentage among pitchers (.983), then the top mark among left-handers. Early life Born in Broken Bow, Oklahoma, Brecheen was acquired by the Cardinals in 1938 from the Chicago Cubs after two minor league seasons, but made only three relief appearances during 194 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cy Blanton
Darrell Elijah (Cy) Blanton (July 6, 1908 – September 13, 1945) was an American starting pitcher in Major League Baseball who played for the Pittsburgh Pirates and Philadelphia Phillies. Blanton batted left-handed and threw right-handed. Blanton was a screwball pitcher. Pitching career Blanton grew up in Trousdale, Oklahoma, and was living in Shawnee, Oklahoma, playing on sandlot teams. In 1929 he joined the Shawnee Robins, a C Class team in the Western Association. Blanton was a pitcher for the Independence Producers in 1931. The Independence Producers were a Class C minor league team located in Independence, Kansas. Blanton had twelve wins and eight losses for the season. Blanton was one of the mainstays of the Pittsburgh Pirates rotation in the mid-1930s. He pitched for the Albany Senators in 1934, being promoted to Pittsburgh to pitch one game. Earlier he pitched in the Piedmont League and the Western Association. In his 1935 rookie season he recorded 18 wins with 14 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Luis Arroyo
Luis Enrique "Tite" Arroyo, (February 18, 1927 – January 13, 2016) was a Puerto Rican Major League Baseball pitcher from 1955 to 1963. Arroyo was the first Puerto Rican player to appear for the New York Yankees and was a key part of their pennant winning seasons in and .Staff Writer (January 17, 2016"Star reliever during Yankees magical 1961 season" ''The Washington Post'', page C7. Baseball career Arroyo, from Peñuelas, Puerto Rico, made his MLB debut on April 20, 1955. A stocky left-hander, he spent one season primarily as a starter with the St. Louis Cardinals. Though he was a member of the National League All-Star team that year, he was traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates the next spring, where he was moved to the bullpen. Struggling to establish himself in the role, he went from the Pirates to the Cincinnati Redlegs, then the New York Yankees. Arroyo was the first to play for the Yankees, and despite his earlier struggles, he quickly became an important contributor to the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jack Baldschun
Jack Edward Baldschun (October 16, 1936 – June 6, 2023) was an American professional baseball pitcher. He was a relief pitcher in Major League Baseball (MLB) for all or part of nine seasons (1961–67; 1969–70), for the Philadelphia Phillies, Cincinnati Reds, and San Diego Padres. Baldschun threw and batted right-handed, and was listed as tall, weighing . Personal life Baldschun was a graduate of Greenville High School in his native Greenville, Ohio. He was originally signed by the Washington Senators out of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, in 1956. Baldschun spent only one year in the Washington organization before he was acquired by Cincinnati and assigned to their Class C affiliate in Wausau, Wisconsin. In 1957, while playing minor league baseball for the Lumberjacks, he met his future wife, Charlotte Kolbe. They were married on April 10, 1958, and had two children, Kim and Brad. Baseball career Baldschun was selected by the Phillies in the Rule 5 draft on November ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bobby Castillo
Robert Ernie "Babo" Castillo Jr. (April 18, 1955 – June 30, 2014) was an American professional baseball pitcher. He played for the Los Angeles Dodgers and Minnesota Twins of Major League Baseball (MLB) between and . He was in the bullpen for the Dodgers in the 1981 World Series, pitching one inning against the New York Yankees. He also pitched one season in Japan for the Chunichi Dragons in . Castillo is credited with teaching his former Dodgers teammate, Fernando Valenzuela, how to throw a screwball A screwball is a baseball and fastpitch softball pitch that is thrown so as to break in the opposite direction of a slider or curveball. Depending on the pitcher's arm angle, the ball may also have a sinking action. The pitch is sometimes known .... Castillo died on June 30, 2014, from cancer at the age of 59. References External links {{DEFAULTSORT:Castillo, Bobby 1955 births 2014 deaths Albuquerque Dukes players 20th-century American sportsmen American baseball p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tom Browning
Thomas Leo Browning (April 28, 1960 – December 19, 2022) was an American left-handed pitcher in Major League Baseball who played from 1984 to 1995, spending almost his entire career with the Cincinnati Reds. In his rookie season in 1985, Browning won 20 games and was runner-up for the National League (NL) Rookie of the Year Award; he was the Reds' first 20-game winner in 15 years, and equalled the most wins by a Cincinnati lefthander since 1925. He quickly became a mainstay in the team's pitching rotation, leading the NL in games started four of the next five years. Browning pitched the twelfth perfect game in major league history on September 16, 1988, against the Los Angeles Dodgers, just the third perfect game by a lefthander; it was the highlight of a season in which he was 18–5, posting the league's second-highest winning percentage. He helped the Reds to a sweep in the 1990 World Series, winning Game 3 against the defending champion Oakland Athletics. In 1991 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jen-Lei Liao
Liao Jen-lei (; born August 30, 1993) is a Taiwanese professional baseball pitcher for the Fubon Guardians of the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL). He has previously played in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) for the Saitama Seibu Lions. Early life Liao was born in Taoyuan, Taiwan on 30 August 1993, to parents who played baseball and softball. He attended in Japan, and graduated from Kainan University in his hometown of Taoyuan. Career Pittsburgh Pirates Liao signed with the Pittsburgh Pirates of Major League Baseball in January 2014. He pitched for the rookie-level Gulf Coast League Pirates, primarily as a reliever, for two seasons and was subsequently released. While in the Pirates organization, Liao appeared in the 2015 Asian Baseball Championship as a member of the Chinese Taipei national baseball team. Yomiuri Giants Following his release, Liao returned to Japan, where he had attended high school, and was selected by the Yomiuri Giants in the seventh round o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
