Every morning, the We Love Baseball crew reviews the nastiest pitches from the previous day’s games in glorious high-definition GIFs. We want to bring you the highest caliber of nastiness possible, so if you see a nasty pitch, please tell us about it. You can tweet @PitcherList to let us know and we’ll give you a shout-out here in the article if your tip makes the cut.
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Jacob deGrom’s Four-Seam Fastball
https://gfycat.com/adorablemessybluetonguelizard
Another day, another Jacob deGrom masterpiece on the mound. At this point, the platitudes are redundant so I’ll leave our Nastiest Pitches readers with a question: If Jacob deGrom retires this offseason after winning another Cy Young award should he make the Hall of Fame? Is his short term run of dominance enough to get him in the hallowed halls?
Lance McCullers’ Knuckle-Curve
https://gfycat.com/directdimpledeft
Lance McCullers pitched well last night, but his counterpart Marco Gonsalves pitched a gem to get the Mariners a win. McCullers has such tremendous movement on all his pitches and the Mariners broadcast’s beautiful camera angle gives a great view of McCullers’ nasty breaking ball.
Luis Castillo’s Changeup
https://gfycat.com/violetdamagedcarp
Luis Castillo was effective last night primarily using his high-velocity fastball and signature changeup. Castillo was able to freeze Christian Yelich with this changeup with great lateral movement. I still think it catches the outside black even if the broadcast strike zone box disagrees.
Brandon Woodruff’s Four-Seam Fastball
https://gfycat.com/rectangularbriskalligatorgar
Brandon Woodruff has a straight fastball that doesn’t appear to get a ton of rising action so it has to be thrown hard and with good command for him to avoid home runs and hard-hit balls. This fastball at 100 MPH right on the outside black freezes Joey Votto who has been lauded for his great batting eye over his long career.
Adam Ottavino’s Slider
https://gfycat.com/definitiveficklebighornsheep
Adam Ottavino hasn’t been included in Nastiest Pitches as many times as he was last year, and I’d like to do a little more research to see if he’s lost any lateral movement on his great slider. Whether he’s lost a little movement on his slider or not, the pitch is still aesthetically beautiful and tough to hit.
James Karinchak’s Curveball
https://gfycat.com/advanceddeadconch
James Karinchak is a curveball demon. Karinchak is a ball of energy on the mound and, as pitchingninja pointed out on twitter, Edwin Encarnación also likes to fidget. Karinchak was able to get Encarnación to swing through a well-spotted breaker.