What Domingo German’s spin rate says about cheating, explained
By Josh Wilson
Theory: Pitch movement is the more interesting evidence to look at
As I mentioned earlier in this post, spin rate is important to me and it should be important to you as well. It’s ridiculous to try to completely throw that stat out as a part of the evidence continuum here.
That said, spin rate is not the result of a pitch, rather, it’s an input to the pitch’s velocity and movement. So, especially in the context of just one pitcher and one game, we should look less at spin rate and more at velocity and movement to understand any advantage gained from a so-called illegal substance.
Here, we can see just that (the numbers next to the pitch type are pitch velocity before the hand wash discussion vs after):
Take from this chart what you will. I’ll walk through how I feel about each pitch and my analysis of the data here.
As I explained earlier in the article, the sinker appears to be a plausible fatigue element, so I am not putting much weight into it here. It also has nearly identical velocity before and after the discussion.
Moving down to the changeup, the speed was just a bit slower (plausibly fatigue). Here, though, we see that the changeup has more of a drop after the conversation. This makes sense because German lost 114 RPM on the pitch after the hand-washing conversation.
Down to curve, the pitch velocity stayed the same but moved better after the hand wash conversation.
Lastly, the fastball had less horizontal movement after the conversation than before.
Conclusion: Curveball is the only suspicious element here, with small question about fastball
So, if you’re on board with me about the fact that spin rate isn’t as important as pitch outcomes (velocity and movement) because it’s an input to those outcomes, then you should really only be worried about the changeup.
The changeup should move like a fastball but much slower, creating deception. It was moving in a straight line more before the hand wash conversation, and after the fact, it moved almost 2 inches more.
German threw 13 curveballs before the hand wash talk and 17 after.
Do with this information what you will. Hopefully, this equips you with information and context to formulate your own take.
Spin rate doesn’t matter | Spin rate could be due to fatigue | Best stuff all year cheating proof?
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