“A 77 mph pitch in little league is the equivalent of a 100 mph major league pitch.” ESPN
LMAO
Yeah man, haven’t you heard of the 1.3 discount factor applied to all major league stats?
I can’t tell if this is a joke. In case you seriously don’t know it’s true - it’s because the mound is further away from the plate in a major league park.
Um, from the point of release (mound), the ball laterally decelerates due to air resistance making the reverse true. Or at best if you ignore frictions it maintains constant velocity. Although, I guess you’re refering to total reaction time, in which you may have a point.
LMAO
So if some Ivan Drago pitcher can thow 500 mph and he throws from whatever distance is necessary to make the flight time the same as a 95 mph pitch traveling 60’6" (distance from mound to home plate) that is the same thing?
You guys kill me. I know anytime I need a laugh to come to this website.
Maybe they just mean 77mph is the top of the line fast ball for kids making roughly as hard for them to hit as a major leaguer hitting a 100 mph fastball.
Edit: I a word.
Like a kid who ran a 10 sec 100M at age 12 would be like the Usain Bolt of 12 yr olds…gives an idea of dominance adjusted for age group.
Sweep and Palantir correct…
BS is correct that is has to do with reaction time
Blake, I’m going on the assumption you’ve never played baseball although I’m sure you’ll tell me you’re in the Hall of Fame. Obviously 77 mph doens’t equal 100 mph, but 46’ isn’t equal to 60’6" either, so they’re taking the ratio to compare them = reaction time. People who watch ESPN love stats, and it’s easier to simplify into relative mph comparisons, as I doubt viewers will want reaction time statistics. Imagine the excitement when little Timmy reaches back for a record-breaking 0.402 second reaction time fastball…what?
If mph is the only measure that matters I’d be happy to pitch to you from 10 feet and you can tell me if it’s easy to hit 80 mph.
^this. although i’m sure they’re assuming the same swing speed for simplicity. even if the reaction time is the same, you need a much faster swing speed to catch up to a 100 mph pitch if you decide to swing at the same point in time from release of the pitch (which should be the same distance from the hitting zone because of the different mound distances).
like sundevil says you’re average viewer just wants simple stats that help them make comparisons.
It takes .4125 seconds for a 100 mph pitch to cross the plate at 60.5 feet and it takes .3896 seconds for a 77 mph pitch to cross the plate at 44 feet.
I’m going to need this in knots and furlongs to make any sense of it.
you guys are reading way too much into it…sweep and palantir’s argument stands…you guys can go crunch the numbers and use all the physics equations you want…
Agree with Blake. ESPN is dumb. 77 =/= 100.
Thats like saying a C average in little league is like an A+ in the majors. Complete BS
Me gusta
Yes, r*t=d is very complex stuff. We should probably move this thread over to Wilmott. Looks like that pop TV’s taking it’s toll Frankie. Time to go read a book.
lol
Wouldn’t it be more like saying an A+ in little league is like a C average in the majors? That sounds more plausible, though I don’t know if and how handicapping is done to make things look equivalent in this context.
In general, wind drag increases with the square of velocity, so if there is a correction for distance from the mound, and one measures down to the 1000th of a second, perhaps there is some correction to make them comparable. If the 100 mph ball is going 1.3x faster, then (1.3^2 / 1^2) - 1 = 0.69 so the air drag is 69% stronger for the 100 mph ball when it’s at that velocity. If they are timing the ball from mound to plate and accounting for the effect of air resistance to back out the speed of the ball as it leaves the pitcher’s hand, I could see something like this being realistic.
Then again, I really don’t follow how the stats are constructed, so maybe it’s just the average time it takes to get from mound to plate.
Good point, never thought about the swing speed. I wonder how fast the average Little Leaguer swings? You would probably have to factor in length of swing too.