Radar Gun at Shea

[mletto157]

Does anyone else think the radar gun at Shea Stadium has to be off? Parra topping out at 90 MPH, Sheets & Santana so far topping out at 91 MPH. What's up with that?

[Ennder]

gameday has sheets at 89-92 which isn't abnormal at all for him in the 1st inning.

[heresrobin]

Seems slow to me too. Santana's fastball has been sitting 85-87 mph. Unless that's normal for him.

[mletto157]

I don't think that's a normal fastball for Johan.

[twobrewers]

Yesterday Parra was topping out around 86-87 the whole game as well.

 

I know the weather was a factor, but that is about 5 MPH slowing that Parra was throwing in Milwaukee.

 

I think the gun is at least 3 or 4 MPH off. I can't believe Brian and Bill just keep talking about how Ben's velocity is down - and completely ignore that Johan is down as well. It seems pretty obvious the gun isn't right.

[rluzinski]

Sheets' velocity is actually a couple ticks down. He's around 91-92 right now, according to pitch f/x. He averaged 93-94 in his first 2 starts. The Shea gun is around 4 MPH slow, though.

[owbc]

The Shea gun is probably correct and the guns everywhere else are exaggerated.

[mletto157]

Haha

[kmcasper23]

That Muniz guy from the Mets was only throwing 85mph and he appeared to be bringing it quite well. Not to mention Gagne was topping out at 88. I hope that wasn't accurate since he also looked like he was throwing it well.

[dadofandrew]

The slow gun is about 3-4 mph slower than the "fast" one. Neither is right or wrong, one just picks up the ball earlier.

 

90 with location is oodles better than 95 down the middle anyway. What's important is what a guy is throwing now versus earlier...if Ben is 90-92 all game, and then throws 87, 86, he's all but done...same thing if you add 4 to all the numbers.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

That's what makes Ben Sheets such a great pitcher. He doesn't need his "A" stuff to mow down hitters.

[Gobias Industries]

That's what makes Ben Sheets such a great pitcher. He doesn't need his "A" stuff to mow down hitters.

Yeah, good stuff. I was reading in a magazine last year and a scout basically said "pitchers have their great stuff for 10 starts, bad stuff for 10 starts, and their average stuff for 10 starts. It's how you pitch with your average stuff to show what kind of pitcher you are and they turn out to be your most important starts."

 

Pretty similar to Pedro's thread of a 42 game season way of thought.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

So should we classify this start by Sheets as having his "Average" stuff?

[Gobias Industries]

I think so. It wasn't like his first 2 starts, that's for sure.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

So where exactly is the correct point to measure the velocity of a pitch? Somebody give me a physics lesson.

[rluzinski]

I know that radar guns don't pick up the velocity of the ball as it crosses home plate, as they are around 85 MPH for a guy who typically reads 93. Gameday's pitch velocity corresponds to pitch f/x's "start velocity", which is read 50 ft from home plate. I think the average radar gun picks it up from right around there as well (possibly a touch closer to home plate).

 

I think it's perfectly fine to say that the radar gun was off today, as no other radar gun in recent memory has shown Sheets consistently throwing under 90 MPH (all the other pitchers' velocities were off as well). Add 4 MPH to what you saw today. Sheets' fastball didn't have it's usual zip today.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

That's very interesting. Thanks for that tidbit, Rluz.