What Pitch Can Help Get You $217 Million?

December 10, 2015

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Last week, David Price signed the biggest contract for a pitcher in the history of baseball, a 7-year, $217 million deal. That comes down to about $1 million per start, $10,000 per pitch.

Some of David Price's career statistics:

104-56 regular season record, 3.09 ERA

3.7 careeer K:B ratio

2012 Cy Young, runner-up in 2010 and 2015

2-7 W-L record and a 5.15 ERA in the postseason

This is the career that has netted $217 million. Yes, Price is durable. Yes he is left-handed.

But HOW did he get $217 million?!?!

An answer can be found in a commentary on the contract:

where the author describes Price's arsenal:

and the frequency of how often his changeup:

So Price now throws his changeup 4 times as often (5.3% to 22.8% of his pitches) and this once again proves Warren Spahn's definition of pitching:

"Hitting is timing. Pitching is upsetting timing."

No pitch is as valuable as a consistent and accurat fastball. But no pitch is as EFFECTIVE as a good changeup. A good changeup makes your fastball "faster", therey disrupting the hitter's timing.

So...

How do you throw a great changeup?

When do you throw that great changeup to the hitter?

Becuase of the importance of these 2 questions, I have put together a video and PowerPoint presentation in my video library on this issue. Click here to watch a video on the library and you click here to subscribe to the video library and gain access to the Changeup presentation.

Have A Question About This Newseltter?

Contact (631-352-7654 / PitchingDoc@msn.com) Dr. Arnold!