A breaking ball is defined as a pitch that creates movement with sharp spin induced from the wrist. But all of the similarities end there. Almost all breaking balls fall into the slider or curveball, but there is a lot of slurviness in between and each pitcher defines their pitches differently. There are different components to a breaking ball and they parallel those of the fastball. There is velocity or hardness, deception, command, movement, and breaking out from movement, shape. Many of the components of a breaking ball are inherent to a pitcher based on their arm, wrist, and delivery.
Velocity in relation to a breaking ball is not a cut and dry with big velocity equaling success. The most obvious implication of velocity is that the faster the pitch the less time the batter has to adjust to the pitch. The trade off to velocity is that it can often come with less movement. This is due to the physics of a thrown baseball, in order to get sharp movement on a hard breaking ball, the pitcher must impart more rotation on to the pitch.
Velocity leads into the shape and movement of the breaking ball, shape I define as the overall path of the pitch and movement is how it goes along that path. Shape is what will tell what kind of pitch it is, a slider tends to break more away from a same sided hitter and a curveball has more vertical movement. The best of both pitches will have movement along both planes. A slider that just breaks horizontally will stay in the bat path a lot longer, especially to an opposing batter. These sliders tend to be called frisbees and their owners will have large platoon splits. With more two plane movement a pitcher can use the slider to break down and away from a same sided hitter and can start on the inside corner to an opposite handed batter and break it in on their feet. Curveballs because of thier vertical movement do a lot more to change the eye level of the hitter. Adding horizontal movement allows a pitcher to start it inside to a same handed batter and have it break into the zone, or have it break out of the zone for a chase pitch.
Beyond the overall path of the ball a big thing with movement is where is the break. The most effective breaking balls have late sharp movement, this gives the batter the least amount of time to adjust to the pitch. A slider with a long sweeping motion will break right into the bat path while giving the hitter plenty of time to adjust. A loopy curveball will be slow enough that a hitter can time it up to hit out like a BP fastball. The key is to have either a pitch that looks like an unhittable pitch that becomes a strike or a pitch that looks like a strike that ends up unhittable. The more it looks like its first incarnation that more effective it will be.
With fastball deception you are looking for a pitch that the pitcher hides or releases weird so that it takes a while to pick up location and pitch type. With a breaking ball the deception is less about funky mechanics and more about whether the pitch looks the same out of the hand as a fastball. Many minor leaguers will throw their breaking ball from a different arm slot than their fastball and changeup, this will work in the minors, but a major leaguer will recognize it in game or in the scouting report and will be ready for it. Another tell tale sign is that some pitchers will release their breaking ball with a different arm speed than their other pitches, this again will be exploited in the majors. An ideal breaking ball will come out of the hand looking the same but with lesser velocity and more movement than the fastball, because of the spin the pitch will have less natural deception than a changeup but it should be combated by more movement on the back end.
The last piece of the puzzle is command. As is true with any pitch, if you are never able to throw it for a strike, hitters will eventually stop swinging at it. A pitcher does not necessarily have to have pinpoint control to be effective, if their is the threat of a strike the hitter will be forced to read the spin and movement of the pitch, this small time spent, can help the chances of poor contact on a swing. What can separate a pitcher and improve their ceiling is true breaking ball command. A breaking ball can be a real weapon if a pitcher can drop it in for a quality strike on one pitch and then start in the zone and bury it on the next pitch. The hitter must then always contend with each pitch because it either looks like or it will be a strike. This can allow a pitcher to get strikeouts to end ABs as well as use their breaking ball as a set up pitch for their other offerings.
Rather than argue who has the best breaking balls, here are the plus breaking balls in the system.
Curveball:
- Shane Watson
- Jesse Biddle
- Severino Gonzalez
- Austin Wright
- Ethan Martin
- Jay Johnson
Slider:
- Adam Morgan
Phuture Phillies 
“The most obvious implication of velocity is that the faster the pitch the more time the batter has to adjust to the pitch.”
HUH?? Not in this world, my friend.
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I think he meant “the slower the pitch” OR “the less time”. One of the other.
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Fixed, it is hard to edit your own work because it always reads the way you meant it
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Ethan Stewart has a pretty good breaking ball when he can throw it for strikes
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This article as well as the fastball make me even more depressed about Aumont. He’d be at or near the top of both lists if he were still eligible for prospect status, and yet look at him. When that much raw talent doesn’t translate to the majors, it makes me even more skeptical about prospects with lesser tools.
Note: I know command/control is Aumont’s issue… but isn’t it always?
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It is why I will never give up on him in any org. You cannot teach raw stuff like that, and even when he is not on he is still ok. Even with as bad as he looked this year his AAA ERA was 4.04 and his major league ERA was 4.19 (3.57 FIP).
He has the best fastball (minus command) in the org with the combination of velocity and movement and he has the best curveball.
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Aumont has at least three potential plus pitches – 4 seem FB, 2 seem FB/Sinker, Curve – his stuff is ridiculous. I’m hoping he can turn over a new leaf with the change in administration. I think Dubee was not a bad pitching coach but was exactly the opposite of what Aumont needs, which is a guy who will be a mentor to him. I’m not here to provide excuses, but Aumont had a very troubled childhood and I think he simply has a distrust of guys who are trying to give him “tough love.” Before anyone starts complaining about players and babying and all that other garbage, all I’m saying is that different people respond to different bosses/coaches and I think a change will be good for Aumont. I attach no value judgments to this observation whatsoever.
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I recall Aumont complaining that he constantly got different and conflicting advice on how to fix his control/command from various people with the team and he felt that left him more confused. I don’t recall if he said different players or different coaches, but if coaches are giving advice that conflicts between the different levels, that is a bit of a concern. There are many ways to skin a cat (most disturbing cliche ever), but the Pitching coaches across levels should really be working from the same development plan.
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He obviously doesn’t respond to the tough love approach. He has so much talent, we’ve all seen it. However, if you watch him throw 5 times, you’re likely to see at least 3 different release points and that can’t happen (unless you’re Pedro and its on purpose).
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It appears that is going to take some ‘ah-ha’ moment for Aumont, if it ever comes. I certainly hope the Phillies have tried some different options with him. At some point, all the advice can get cluttered as “nothing seems to work”.
It would certainly be amazing to see him ptich if his command improves.
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For comparison, how much different is a cutter (seems very generic when I hear it mentioned) vs. a slider?
Is there any support to theory that ‘breaking balls’ in general lead to more arm injuries?
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The distinction I make between cutter and slider is the grip and how it is used. A slider has more movement and often less velocity, a cutter is meant to have sharp quick break near the bat. Cutters span the line between fastball, breaking ball, and changeup, and I tend to classify them more as a form of changeup as they are meant to look like a normal fastball, but not be a normal fastball. The reason the cutter blends is that its development can come from giving a fastball movement (Rivera) as well as tightening up a slider (Lee).
I don’t have a study, but everything I have heard is that breaking balls due to put the arm at slightly more risk due to the strains, but it is not a huge injury determiner. However, improperly thrown breaking balls can put a lot of strain on the arm. For this reason I won’t knock a pitcher for throwing too many breaking balls, but I wouldn’t allow anyone under the age of about 16 to throw one as a primary in-game pitch.
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That’s what Keith Law always says, right? (That kids under 16 shouldn’t be throwing breaking balls.)
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It is, in reality there are very few HS level coaches who know how to teach a breaking ball (and even fewer parents), the risk is just too high. I just think we break down kids bodies before they are ready, and it is leading to younger superstars but it also is leading to more injured athletes on lower levels of competition
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Is it really that difficult to teach a breaking ball? My dad told me the basics of how to throw a curve when I was 14 and after a couple days I had one with a pretty nasty bite. Of course I was always primarily a 3B and never really had a shot of ever going anywhere in baseball so I wasn’t exactly at risk of hurting my arm pitching. But I never really figured it was difficult to learn. Maybe that’s just one of those things I pick up quickly.
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It can be a real feel pitch that can just be there. It is less about making it look good and more doing that and having the elbow be fine
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My brother was 13 and threw a very, very, nasty slider (he took his team to a few championships on this pitch). But after a while he started having pain in his elbow and dropped the picth all together. His elbow pain went away after a while. Now he’s 16, and throwing the slider occasionally, but overuse of it causes him pain.
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First of all keith law blows and he is paid to and Im almost positive nobody in the Dominican Republic has a coach that says , hey kid dont throw a curve ball it will ruin your future,
sorry Matt we disagree again
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It’s pretty common knowledge but I’m going to take your word for it as you made a great argument.
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Well to be fair we don’t have to look very far since this is phuturePHILLIES. Both Gavin Floyd and Jesse Biddle had above-average curveballs coming out of High School and were considered as such by scouts and it was then then the PHILLIES who told both players they were not allowed to throw their curveball.
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And Gavin’s curveball and his command of it were never the same again. This was conventional player development wisdom carried to a very unhealthful extreme. Yes, it makes total sense to force a guy like Floyd to work on his FB command and development of a third pitch. You can still do that quite well, while throwing 40% of your strikes as curve balls. It is only common sense that it is possible to lose a ‘touch’ pitch if you stop using it and the muscle memory erodes. The Phillies have jerked around a large number of very talented minor leaguers over the past couple decades, but Floyd was one of the worst instances.
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