Sports in a new way

            I never thought that baseball was a game of math and science. Being a pitcher myself, and knowing nothing about “mechanics”, I thought baseball was a finesse game-a game of understanding how to do something within yourself. I had to work on my swing individually and perfect my motion alone, on the mound. A lack of coaching, maybe, but it could have also been a lack of research. Now that I found a book lying around my house, I’ve seen the game in a completely new way.

            The Physics of Baseball by Robert K. Adair has been the book I’ve been reading recently. It’s sophisticated and contains difficult terms to comprehend, but as an athlete, it helps. This book talks about trajectories, angle measures for optimal pitching, throwing, hitting, etc., and even variables which affect the game even more than you may think. Just some wind could mess up a pitcher’s game. I thought it was annoying, but I didn’t know that it messed with the flight pattern of each pitch. The ball is too heavy right? Wrong. The book even talks about how bat speed affects the distance of which the ball is hit. For example, you can’t hit a ball over 450 feet if you don’t have the bat speed of 77 mph.

            This book has taught me tons about the sport of baseball. I can conclude that the game takes a mix of both in order to succeed, but you can get by with only having one. If you don’t know about the optimal bat angle to hit a ball far, but your swing works for you, that’s fine. As for the math whizzes who aren’t the jocks, but wish to play on a team, I highly suggest this book-you can take it word for word and do very well too. Lastly, I strongly suggest people who take their game as seriously as I try to, to take a look at this book. I will never look at the game of baseball the same way again.