Clipping:Martin's delivery
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| Date | Sunday, January 24, 1869 |
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| Text | An ordinary pitcher, when he faces a batsman, relies simply upon his speed or wild delivery to bother his opponent. A first-class pitcher does neither; he simply studies his man, and tries to discover his weak points, and to take advantage of them. This is the feature of first-class pitching, and not either swift pitching, or the unfair delivery which marks wild pitching. For instance, Martin, when he is told to send in a ball knee-high, does not pitch every other ball or so out of the reach of the batsman; but he first tries to find out where the batsman can best hit a ball, or where he really likes to have them pitched to him–every batsman has a favorite spot, which, if wise, he keeps to himself–and having found that out, Martin takes care to send as few balls there as possible. The fact is, his success in pitching has been the result of his skill in being able to apparently send in a ball easy to hit without doing it. Let almost any other man attempt to pitch the same paced ball which Martin does, and he would find himself a badly-punished pitcher. It is not because he does not pitch swiftly; and especially is it absurd to attribute his success to any twist he imparts to the ball; for twist, in fair pitching, is worse than useless, as it only bothers the catcher and adds to his chances of passed balls. The simple secret of Martin’s success is that he uses his head as well as his arm, and studies his man, finds out his weak points, and uses strategy instead of relying upon mere speed or unfair delivery. itself is a good point of his play. He gives as little warning of the delivery of the ball as possible. It leaves his hand quick; and what is most important of all, the ball comes to the bat in deceptive curves. The nearer the line of a pitched ball reaches the horizontal in its approach to the bat, the easier it is to judge and to hit it. Very swift pitching causes a ball to approach the bat nearly on a straight line, and a quick eye can direct the bat to hit it every time. But in this case the pace of the ball renders necessary the most rapid movement of the arms in swinging the bat; and hence it is that those not strong in wrist play, or who wield too heavy a bat, or who take too wide a circle in swinging the bat, fail to hit swift pitching; but in reality the swiftly-delivered ball is the least difficult to hit of the two, provided both are pitched for the bat. |
| Source | New York Sunday Mercury |
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| Submitted by | Richard Hershberger |
| Origin | Initial Hershberger Clippings |
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