Every morning we review the nastiest pitches from the previous day’s games in glorious HD GIFs. Don’t forget to vote for your favorite pitch and check back this weekend to see if it will be in contention for the GIF of the First Half Contest. Did we miss your favorite pitch? Send us a tweet next time @PitcherList and we’ll GIF it up + give you a shoutout here in the article.
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Clayton Kershaw’s Slider – Welcome back old friend. Kershaw pitched for the first time since May 1. He struck out five in five solid innings of work, lowering his season ERA to 1.80. Here he got poor rookie Scott Kingery swinging out of his shoes on his trademark back-foot slider. Nasty.
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Tyler Duffey’s Fastball – Duffey used his unique delivery to bend a 96 mile per hour fastball down and away from the hopeful bat of Yonder Alonso, who got nothing but air. 96 with that kind of movement? Good luck.
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Shane Bieber’s Curveball – There’s going to be One Less Lonely Twins player after Bieber fanned Logan Morrison with this nasty curveball in his big league debut. If you find yourself asking ‘What Do you Mean?’ well then I’m Sorry Baby but I’m Confident you can’t Change Me and all my Justin Bieber references. As long as you all still love me.
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Aaron Nola’s Changeup – It was a happy Nola day indeed for fantasy owners, as Nola struck out seven in seven innings, only allowing one run. It was his changeup here to Yasiel Puig that won him a spot on our list. Check out the sudden, late drop on this pitch. When he’s locating this, it’s unhittable.
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Lance McCullers’ Curveball – McCullers only managed four strikeouts on Thursday, but he still posted a quality start against a strong Red Sox offense. Here he buckles Mitch Moreland with a back foot curveball that gets Moreland to nearly swing out of his shoes. Nasty.
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Jake Odorizzi’s Splitter – Odorizzi got himself a big strikeout with a runner on by getting his splitter to dive down and away from Michael Brantley here in the second inning. Although the rest of his outing did not go so hot, he executed this pitch to perfection.
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Tyler Glasnow’s Slider – Low and in to a left-handed hitter is rarely ideal, but with a hard, tight slider like Glasnow’s, you can get away with it. This pitch broke the length of the plate and landed perfectly on the inside black, completely freezing Dexter Fowler.
GIF Of The Night
Which was your favorite pitch? Vote below and the winner will be featured in the GIF of the First Half Contest.
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