Skip to content

Baseball Aerodynamics

The fluid dynamics of baseball pitches

Primary Menu
  • Home
  • Seam-Shifted Wakes
  • Drag
  • General
  • Links
  • Glossary
  • Press
  • About
  • UMBA
  • Ninja Dictionary

How to “Dial In” a Hack Attack to desired RPM and Velo: Post 75

Posted on July 19, 2022July 19, 2022 by bartonlsmith

Our high school owns a Hack Attack pitching machine. These machines have 3 solid wheels. We own the huge one that can do nearly anything. BUT, when you are operating it, any adjustment to the knobs alters RPM and velo at the same time, and often in the opposite way Continue Reading

Posted In General

Effect of Velocity or Altitude on Seam Shifted Wake. Part 3 of 4: Post 74

Posted on April 28, 2022April 28, 2022 by bartonlsmith

This is the third post based on John Garrett’s MS Thesis. Like 73, this won’t stand on its own. I recommend starting back at 72. Since the start of this work, all of our measurements have been made at 90 mph. We chose that number using what a friend of Continue Reading

Posted In Seam-Shifted Wakes

NEW SSW RESULTS: Effect of Seams Upstream (PART 2 OF 4). POST 73

Posted on February 19, 2022April 28, 2022 by bartonlsmith

Part 1 was focused on non-spinning balls in a 4S configuration at 90 mph. This post will turn the ball 90º to focus on 2S orientations. In the next post, we’ll talk about results from lower and higher speeds followed by spinning baseballs. For each of these cases, there are Continue Reading

Posted In Seam-Shifted Wakes

Post 72b: Separation upstream of a seam.

Posted on January 13, 2022January 13, 2022 by bartonlsmith

In post 72, I presented the map below (this post won’t make a lot of sense if you haven’t read that). This post will be about the blue region. A seam in this region (roughly from -10º to -28º) can sometimes cause laminar separation farther forward. The average location is Continue Reading

Posted In General, Seam-Shifted Wakes

New SSW Results: Baseballs these days don’t know who they want to be (Part 1 of 4). Post 72

Posted on January 11, 2022April 28, 2022 by bartonlsmith

My (now former) student, John Garrett (@jwillyg20) has been working on new measurements of Seam Shifted Wake (SSW) for a couple of years. He just wrapped them up around Christmas and will soon finalize his MS thesis. This and the next few posts will be based on that work. You Continue Reading

Posted In Seam-Shifted Wakes

Training Kids with Smart Baseballs: Post 71

Posted on November 13, 2021November 13, 2021 by bartonlsmith

Say you are the parent of a 14 year old pitcher and you want to explore the world of pitch design. You have seen the “smart baseball” ads and are curious about them, but what could you do with that information if you had it? I’m glad you asked. First Continue Reading

Posted In General

The Cubs and Seam Shifted Wake: Post 70

Posted on April 11, 2021April 11, 2021 by bartonlsmith

I identify strongly with the Cubs and Seam-Shifted Wakes, so it’s a good day. Sahadev Sharma published an article in The Athletic on April 11, 2021 about how SSW affects the Cubs pitchers. He had noticed something I had also noted: that compared to a lot of teams, the Cubs Continue Reading

Posted In General, Seam-Shifted Wakes

PitchTracker: Post 69

Posted on April 1, 2021April 1, 2021 by bartonlsmith

Nice. One of the first challenges we encountered was a means to detect Seam Shifted Wake in pitches. Doing so requires a measurement of vertical and horizontal movement as well as spin metrics. Right now, if you are anyone other than a major league team (meaning you have a HawkEye Continue Reading

Posted In General, Seam-Shifted Wakes

2020 Seam Shifted Wake Leaderboards: Post 68

Posted on February 10, 2021February 10, 2021 by bartonlsmith

This made me realize it was high time that I made one. First, the best SSW T-shirt is this one: There are other boards out there. BaseballSavant.com has one I use often. Click leaderboards and then pitching and spin. For any given pitch type, you can sort on the “Deviation” Continue Reading

Posted In Seam-Shifted Wakes

Baseball’s Tower of Babel: Post 67

Posted on January 10, 2021December 1, 2021 by bartonlsmith

My dad is a preacher and I’m prone to religious references. Baseball has a lot of technical terms. Unfortunately, many quantities are know by 2-3 names and the problem grows every time we obtain a new metric. I’ve been at this for about 2 years and I am amazed how Continue Reading

Posted In General

Posts navigation

1 2 … 8 Next
Copyright All rights reserved | Theme: Flash Blog by Unitedtheme.