When In Doubt Pitch It Low And Away

“People think I’m smart? You know what makes you smart? Locate your fastball down and away. That’s what makes you smart. You talk to Sandy Koufax, Bob Gibson, or Tom Seaver.  They’ll all tell you the same thing. It’s not your arm that makes you a great pitcher. It’s that thing between both of your ears we call a brain.”

– Greg Maddux (4-time NL Cy Young Award winner.  355 career wins – 8th on the all-time list.  3371 career strikeouts –  10th on the all-time list .  18 Gold Glove awards – 1st on all-time list.  A likely first-ballot Hall of Fame candidate.  He becomes eligible in 2014.)

In my April 29. 2013 post I proclaimed the fundamental job of a pitcher is to throw strikes.  All pitchers young and old must do this or they won’t be pitchers for long.  Throw strikes.  Throw first pitch strikes.  And get ahead and stay ahead in the count.

As kids get older and hitters get better, so too must pitchers get better.  Simply throwing strikes isn’t good enough.  If you’re not smart about where you throw your pitches, hitters will  light you up all game long.  Throwing strikes is a necessary, but not sufficient condition to ensure success as a pitcher.

People often say the three most important things to consider when buying real estate or deciding where to open a retail business, are “location, location, location”.  For a pitcher, location is that important as well.  After simply demonstrating an ability to throw strikes, the next most important thing is to locate your pitches.  I believe locating your pitches is even more important than velocity.  As kids get older and hitters get better, if you’re not able to locate your pitches with consistency, you might not be a pitcher for long.

The first place pitchers must learn to locate their pitches is low in the strike zone.  Pretty much any pitch low in the zone should be considered a good pitch.  A batter may in fact hit the low pitch.  But a batter hitting the low pitch doesn’t make it a bad pitch.  It may simply mean the batter had a good hit.  A pitch low in the strike zone is generally more difficult to hit than one higher in the zone.  A pitch low in the strike zone is generally going to result in a ground ball (or pop up/fly ball) rather than a  hard hit line drive.  It’s not a guarantee, but generally this is true.  So learn how to keep pitches low in the zone.

Relatively speaking, keeping a pitch low in the strike zone doesn’t require a lot of precision.  It takes skills and practice no doubt.  But a pitcher has at least the entire width of the plate (and likely then some depending on the ump) in which to throw a pitch low in the strike zone.

As kids get older and hitters get better, pitchers must learn to locate pitches with precision.  The first “precision” location a pitcher should attempt to master is the pitch low and away in the strike zone.  Of all the locations in and around the strike zone that pitchers should practice throwing to with precision and consistency, low and away for a strike is in my estimation the most important.  And it’s the location that young pitchers should master first.

There are reasons to focus on low and away:

1.  Young batters of all ages often don’t know how to hit the low and away pitch.  Young batters try to pull the low and away pitch (rather than going with the pitch and hitting it in the opposite direction) and simply end up hitting weak ground balls.  The younger the batters, the more likely they are to try and pull the low and away pitch.

2.  A pitcher can miss the low and away location up or down and still have thrown a pretty good pitch.  If the pitch is up, it may still be on the outside corner.  If the pitch is over the plate, it may still be low.  Both are still relatively good pitches.  A pitcher can also miss further outside in which case it’s simply a pitch the batter can’t hit.  A pitcher that misses the low and away location has a pretty good chance of throwing a decent pitch.  A pitcher that misses the mark while trying to pitch the ball to other locations may find himself giving up big hits to the opposition.

3.  Umps are better able and more willing to call the outside pitch for a strike than other pitches.  I attended a coaches’ clinic a couple years ago conducted by the  Minnesota Twins at Target Field and had the opportunity to listen to umpire Bill Peterson (who has been an umpire for many decades and is now the main guy in the state of Minnesota that trains other umps).  He acknowledged that in fact umps have a tendency to call the outside/low and away pitch for a strike more so than a comparable pitch to the inside.  The outside pitch (low and away or otherwise) is physically easier to see I imagine than an inside pitch.  The batter isn’t in the way.  The outside pitch (low and away in particular) is also physically easier to see than a pitch up in the zone.  The catcher isn’t in the way.  The catcher remains crouched.  If a pitcher demonstrates an ability to hit the strike zone low and away, an ump will give the pitcher that call all game long.

Our team went to Cooperstown, NY last summer to play in a tournament.  It was a fun time.  While there I had the opportunity to visit the Baseball Hall of Fame.  Tucked in a little area of the section entitled THE GAME: 1930-1960 was a display dedicated to Ted Williams.  Perhaps you’ve seen it yourself.

In the middle of the overall display is a collection of baseballs configured to represent the strike zone.  The baseballs in this display depict the batting average Ted Williams thought he’d hit if pitchers threw him pitches to these areas of the strike zone.

In case you’re unable to read the batting averages written on the individual baseballs in the photo, here they are:

.300 .320 .320 .330 .330 .315 .310

.310 .340 .340 .350 .340 .340 .320

.310 .340 .340 .350 .340 .340 .320

.340 .380 .380 .400 .390 .390 .320

.360 .390 .390 .400 .390 .390 .320

.360 .390 .390 .400 .380 .380 .310

.320 .340 .340 .330 .300 .300 .280

.320 .340 .340 .330 .275 .270 .260

.280 .300 .300 .300 .260 .250 .250

.270 .290 .300 .300 .250 .240 .240

.250 .270 .270 .260 .240 .240 .230

Ted Williams is arguably the greatest MLB hitter of all time (Tony Gwynn would be a pretty good candidate as well).  Ted Williams batted left handed.  And by his own account as depicted in this Hall of Fame display, pitches low and away in the strike zone would result in his lowest batting averages.  (For a left-handed hitter like Williams, the lower right corner of this Hall of Fame display represents low and away in the strike zone.)  From this display, you can see middle of the plate and up in the zone are generally good for the hitter.  Low in the zone is generally pretty good for the pitcher.  And low and away in the zone is particularly good for the pitcher.

Of course not all hitters are the same.  A ball that Ted Williams had difficulty hitting may be considered just right for someone else.  But Williams is the greatest hitter of all time.  And if he has relative difficulty hitting the low and away pitch, I imagine other hitters would as well.

It’s worth noting that a pitcher can’t simply throw low and away everytime.  There’s more to pitching than simply throwing to a single spot all the time.  A pitcher has to change locations, up and down, and inside and out in the strike zone.  But I’m of the opinion that a pitcher must master the low and away pitch.  A pitcher that can hit that spot with consistency when he tries to do so, will be a tough pitcher to hit.

Master low and away with your fastball.

Then master low and away with your change-up.

Then master low and away with your curve (or slider).

Pitch to this location with confidence.

And when in doubt, pitch it low and away.