Rangers’ Yu Darvish freezes LaRoche with eephus pitch

Part of what makes Yu Darvish so dominant is his ability to be unpredictable. That has several meanings, when it comes to the Japanese-Iranian ace of the Texas Rangers. Darvish entered into Major League Baseball being rumored to throw at least 7 different pitches. What that can be boiled down to is perhaps not seven entirely different pitches, but seven different speed ranges with different movements.

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Whereas most pitchers can wow folks by lighting up the radar gun with triple digit fastball heat, Darvish does the opposite. Don’t misunderstand – Darvish can still get his fastball into the mid-to-upper 90s when the situation calls for it. His fastball appears to hover for an instant between his hand and the plate before taking off like a rocket towards its destination in the catcher’s mitt. His slider remains one of the most devastating late-movement pitches in the game today, even three years later. Perhaps he won’t be lighting up the radar gun, but Darvish can cause a radar gun to not register a reading.

Impressive curve balls and off-speed pitches range anywhere from 10-20 miles per hour slower than the fastball. With that, it’s not just the movement of the ball that throws the hitter off, it is the rapid change in speed that throws their timing off. There are three possible outcomes. First, the hitter, anticipating something much faster, swings much earlier than necessary and misses. Secondly, the hitter could be anticipating the pitch and can wait back nicely on it. If that’s the case, the ball likely ends up 400 feet from home plate, bouncing around the bleachers. Finally, you have a hitter like Washington Nationals first baseman Adam LaRoche.

The speed of the pitch is usually displayed where the name and pitch count appear in the score box area of the screen. Most off-speed pitches are 10-20 miles per hour slower than the fastball and Darvish has that; it’s listed as a ‘regular curveball.’ This ‘slow-curve,’ which is probably better off listed as an eephus pitch was clocked by the in-stadium gun at 59 miles per hour – which would be approximately 37 miles per hour slower than the hardest fastball Darvish threw during his 8 scoreless innings in Sunday’s win over the Nationals.