Relation Between Lift Force and Ball Spin for Different Baseball Pitches

Abstract

Although the lift force (FL) on a spinning baseball has been analyzed in previous studies, no study has analyzed such forces over a wide variety of spins. The purpose of this study was to describe the relationship between FL and spin for different types of pitches thrown by collegiate pitchers. Four high-speed video cameras were used to record flight trajectory and spin for 7 types of pitches. A total of 75 pitches were analyzed. The linear kinematics of the ball was determined at 0.008-s intervals during the flight, and the resultant fluid force acting on the ball was calculated with an inverse dynamics approach. The initial angular velocity of the ball was determined using a custom-made apparatus. Equations were derived to estimate the FL using the effective spin parameter (ESp), which is a spin parameter calculated using a component of angular velocity of the ball with the exception of the gyro-component. The results indicate that FL could be accurately explained from ESp and also that seam orientation (4-seam or 2-seam) did not produce a uniform effect on estimating FL from ESp.