Types of Baseball Pitches

The goal for a pitcher is to pitch the ball into the strike zone, but not into the middle of it. Any good hitter can hit a pitch in the middle of the strike zone, and, in the majors for instance, this could equate to a home run. Instead, a pitcher needs to vary their pitches around the edges of the strike zone to make the pitch harder to hit and to keep the batter on their toes. High pitches tend to be pop-ups and low pitches tend to be grounders. A perfect pitch may be unhittable. For example, a pitch to the bottom left corner of the strike zone on a left handed batter would be almost directly under their hands. The strike zone is the width of the plate about from about the abdomen to the knees of the batter. In younger leagues, the strike zone is much bigger as pitchers are just learning and coaches want their players to hit.

A fastball is what is sounds like: a pitch that is thrown fast. Many fastballs do not have much movement on them and, therefore, are relatively straight pitches that rely on speed. In the majors, pitch speeds on fastballs go well into the nineties and breach the 100 mph barrier from time to time.

Here are some types of fastballs:
1. Four-seam fastballs -- the really fast ones
2. Sinker -- some downward movement
3. Cutter -- a fast slider, so it breaks to one side
4. Forkball -- spins forward, not backward
5. Splitter -- like a forkball, but drops more suddenly

Breaking balls are slower than fastballs but have a lot more movement. They don't rely so much on speed but more on tricking the batter so they swing and miss or foul.

Here are the types of breaking balls:
1. Curveball -- sorry to be obvious, but the ball curves
2. Slider -- a fast version of the curveball
3. Screwball -- breaks in the opposite direction to a curveball (used on opposite-handed batters)

A change up is pitched to look like a fast ball, but goes at a different speed, generally slower, tricking the batter into swinging too soon.

Types of change ups:
1. Palmball -- ball slows down faster than a fast ball, so it reaches the batter at a much slower speed
2. Circle Change -- looks exactly like a fastball except the pitcher's fingers are positioned so that the pitch speed is much slower

There are a few other types of pitches that don't really fit in any other category.

Here are some:
1. Knuckleball -- has almost no spin, making it very unpredictable (hard for both the batter to hit and the catcher to catch, not to mention it's hard for the pitcher to control)
2. Eephus Pitch -- has a high arch, making it harder for the batter to judge
3. Spitball -- some liquid is applied to the ball, making it spin differently
4. Gyroball -- has a bullet spin