An established Boston financial professional, Scott Bushley works at the hedge fund Granite Point Capital. A fitness enthusiast, Scott Bushley serves on the board of directors for the Cohasset Youth Baseball & Softball Association and has coached baseball for half a dozen years.
While curveballs and changeups present their own issues, the fastball is the bread and butter of many pitchers, but hitters who can gauge what’s coming stand a decent chance of making contact with the ball and driving home runs. Toward this end, quick reactions are essential.
While necessary, swift responses alone are insufficient against top pitchers, as a ball traveling from the mound to the plate at 100 miles per hour does so in 400 milliseconds. Typical human reaction time is 200 milliseconds and swinging the bat requires another 100 milliseconds, which leaves only 100 milliseconds to inspect the ball as it leaves the pitcher’s hand.
Seemingly snap judgments actually rely on the batter buying precious milliseconds of extra observational time and studying the motion of the pitcher’s arm and positioning of the hand. The savvy hitter can then anticipate the direction and velocity of the ball as it comes toward the plate.
This level of pattern recognition calls for intimate knowledge of the pitcher and their tendencies, which indicate whether the ball thrown is a changeup or a fastball and if swinging immediately would place the batter well in front of the ball.
While curveballs and changeups present their own issues, the fastball is the bread and butter of many pitchers, but hitters who can gauge what’s coming stand a decent chance of making contact with the ball and driving home runs. Toward this end, quick reactions are essential.
While necessary, swift responses alone are insufficient against top pitchers, as a ball traveling from the mound to the plate at 100 miles per hour does so in 400 milliseconds. Typical human reaction time is 200 milliseconds and swinging the bat requires another 100 milliseconds, which leaves only 100 milliseconds to inspect the ball as it leaves the pitcher’s hand.
Seemingly snap judgments actually rely on the batter buying precious milliseconds of extra observational time and studying the motion of the pitcher’s arm and positioning of the hand. The savvy hitter can then anticipate the direction and velocity of the ball as it comes toward the plate.
This level of pattern recognition calls for intimate knowledge of the pitcher and their tendencies, which indicate whether the ball thrown is a changeup or a fastball and if swinging immediately would place the batter well in front of the ball.
