I don’t blame Ripken here, a lot of these guys don’t understand video and frames, and he was probably watching side-by-sides initially when he had that idea, and when asking his video analyst to match frames and he watched it, it made total sense to him. Not his fault, it’s just that he doesn’t understand frames and such.
@@rudinah8547 A fastball that leaves the pitcher’s hand at 95mph could drop to 86mph once it reaches the plate, so depending on where the radar gun is aimed, you could get a different result. Nowadays of course, it’s standardized across all ballparks at all levels so no problem.
@@floridaman6281 you're right, I get that radar guns could have inconsistencies too. Seems like he didn't realise he was just picking one inconsistency over another
Baseball’s media strategy of intentionally belittling its players and their accomplishments is mind-boggling to me. How the hell is any of that stuff helping grow interest in any aspect of the game? It’s infuriating
Tom Koehler who was a pitcher for the Marlins for years said the same thing. He said why does MLB constantly hate on new players while glorifying old players? It's insane. I stopped watching MLB network.
That is a huuuge problem with media covering baseball and the MLB itself not promoting they players and products properly, all that said it is even worst from guys such as Billy Ripken and Steven A Wright , I most of the time take what either one of them say with a ton of salt and scepticism, now with "Baldy" it goes further than egregious with some of the things he says and presents, keep in mind he is on payroll for a Network that covers ONLY baseball, most people are already aware that the ESPN coverage of baseball is appalling and do not fret about it that much but..... Ripken... and some other guys over there. Some comments already here on point: "Sometimes when Billy Ripken talks I zone out" TL:DR ESPN sucks, so does some MLB network content, stick/switch to independent creators/commentators.
@@adrnaline He had a better pitching career than Cal too. Billy came in during the time the O's lost like 29-2 against the Rangers and didnt do any worse than anyone else.
lmao the Musina Ohtani one Moose released it so much sooner then Ohtani. this whole segment was probably inspired by a bunch of guys doing coke in a room watching film
I can’t believe MLB Network thought this segment made sense. Have we gotten to the point where we are now rejecting mph because it “looks the same” when we’re watching it on TV?? It is an absolute fact that one guy is throwing faster than another. Sure there’s something to be said about arm angles, stride, height, etc. but it’s absolutely ridiculous that they would just ignore the mph difference. I can’t even.
i mean this is kind of disingenuous, the whole thing that lots of old guys say is that "oh the radar guns are different now, they're not actually throwing harder, we can just measure more accurately now" whether or not there's any merit to that argument, idk if we'll ever know for certain; we can't go back into the past. but oldheads like Ripken and the guys at the Network keep wanting to try and prove it, and this was just a really dumb attempt and proving themselves right. very very dumb, actually, but not because they're arguing MPH; that's the entire point they're making, that the MPHs of the ball aren't different, but the radar gun spits out a different reading of MPH nowadays
What they did is like having 6'0" person stand next to a 6'2" person, then having a person 100 feet away say who is taller. "Oh they look the same height to me" lol.
One thing that is stupid...why use miles per hour? Feet per second would make so much more sense. Miles per hour on a pitch that will travel the length of a driveway in 1 second.
@@swirvinbirds1971 But how many of us routinely drive 90+ mph? Little league pitchers can throw the ball at highway speeds. And it's not like we have an understanding of what mph means over short distances. We know things like "it takes 15 minutes to get to the store going 30mph" or "it takes 2 hours to get to the beach going 60mph". But how long does it take to drive to your neighbor's house at 100mph? It's basically instantaneous. Doesn't really provide much intuitive understanding even if you can mathematically understand that going 100mph will get you there faster than going 95mph. But if you tell someone that a pitcher throws 150 feet per second, they could understand that at that speed they could walk to their neighbor's house in under half a second, and that is very intuitive.
Fantastic video. Did not have the tech to break it down like you did, but even when I watched it I couldn't get over the whole "eyeball it guys doesn't it look the same". Really appreciated your larger point as well about MLBN. Watching a lot of their segments they're so disconnected with how the game is played today and as someone who wants to see baseball promoted well, it's sad that this is the flagship network for the league.
MLB tonight to get the look ins and quick pitch for the recap are about the only watchable things on the network now. MLB tonight can actually be really good it just depends if like Pedro is on or not lol
And this is why teams use high speed cameras for pitchers you need insane FPS to pick up actual info. Maybe someone in MLB networks film room should inform their host
What I really like about you Bailey is your reluctance to try and go for the home run with your analysis and instead give a balanced and rational view of the game while still maintaining a clear enthusiasm. Honestly so many guys in your role would feel such pressure to bow to the standard form of analysis but you’re doing your thing and I’m here for it all the way. Great video.
Each mph is said to be 3-4 inches by batters sometimes. For instance, missing a changeup by a foot means you swung at an 89 mph pitch instead of an 85 mph pitch. Randy Johnson's pitches would look 2mph faster based on his release point.
This gave me a great idea for the MLB. High speed, like 500-1000 fps cameras that record the top pitchers pitches and show off the best ones. Imagine showing a 2500 rpm ball in super slow mo. It could make for some great and easy content for the league and open up genuine talks of frame by frame analysis. You know every team already has one or two of these cameras already
When I was watching this I was saying how inaccurate it was bc of your Willie Mays catch vid where you talked about the inaccuracies of video from years ago and how it’s impossible to tell how much time passed bc of that.
Assuming the pitcher throws the ball exactly 60.5 feet away from home, a ball traveling 100mph would need 6050 frames of video available to make an accurate judgement. This means, you'd need approximately 18000 frames of video to correctly judge this (100mph takes about 400ms to reach home plate in baseball). Basically, this segment is working with a margin of error equivalent to that of using a pound of butter when the recipe calls for a teaspoon.
I feel bad for Billy Ripken sometimes. To him, big bro was always the better of the brothers. His brother got their dad's name, he got the star shortstop role that Billy wanted, he got the HOF plaque. Billy Ripken pulled off a Mathis twice in his career while being an average defender, he probably wanted to "earn" his spot in the majors, but always felt like it was being handed to him simply because of his brothers prowess and not his performance. Meanwhile fans were pointing that out even when he was doing great. In 1987 for the entirety of the season, 22 yr old piss poor player Billy Ripken started at 2B, 27 yr old superstar Cal Ripken Jr. started at SS, and up and coming manager Cal Ripken Sr. managed the Orioles. Billy Ripken was always behind in life, but Billy, this segment doesn't prove that you won't be behind another fastball.
LOVE THIS ENERGY. The way you end it is so important. We should be building each other up. The only reason there are kids in high school throwing 95 now is because of the advancements made by people before them. Jack Leiter, great example. His dad learned a LOT about pitching he was one of the best for his time. The information his dad learned was passed on to him, plus all the technological advancements make it possible for him to be throwing mid 90's consistently before ever even leaving college ball. Truthfully retired players should be proud of how the game is evolving. Their efforts, growth and knowledge made improvements to the game possible.
Did Ripken even imagine how insulting he was to the engineers and the courts (for speeding tickets) that created and rely on the speed measuring technologies? To him: they’ve been making up the results the WHOLE TIME.
Except they do make up the results the whole time for legal measurements. Just look at the difference in breathalyzers, and how cops are allowed to "estimate" your speed and then put their estimate down on the ticket saying it was gunned. Its kind of offensive to the most basic level of thought that you trust these people to actually do a good job.
I was pulling my damn hair out watching this segment live. This segment came off as a big hit piece against new era players to me. God bless you Foolish
@@maxgreineder9867 they are easily better tenfold. Guardians has no roots, spiders and rocks (rockers, just something with rock and roll HOF) would’ve made so much sense
@@pohorex6834 I'm guessing that they wanted to keep a theme with Native American people, because I think the guardian mascot will be a Native American, but I don't know. Rockers is awesome, but I will always want spiders
@@maxgreineder9867 they won’t keep Native American at all, that’s the issue, is that some culture presumes that any sort of representation of a minority culture is derogatory, even though it was meant to represent the first ever Native American player in the MLB. They aren’t keeping anything Native American, nothing close to it
It's wonderful to see this guy's passion for the sport. So smart too. Articulate. Why isn't this guy on MLB? As far as a faster fastball=better pitcher. It's one metric. See Adam Wainwright pitch. You probably won't see more than a few pitches over 90 MPH but damn...that's a whole other kind of better pitcher. This is why such a "boring" sport like baseball is infinitely and enduringly interesting.
Absolutely. One of the last true control freaks. You definitely have to give some small part of that credit to Yadi as his batterymate, making sure the ump sees things their way.
Baseball is only boring because only 10 minutes worth of stuff happens in a 3 hour game. Unless you're the kind of psycho that likes watching the 3 true outcomes.
@@bubba200874426 If the only things you considered to be "stuff" are home runs and run scoring hits then yeah. But there's a lot more going on than that. Every single pitch is part of a battle between the hitter and pitcher. If you learn to appreciate good pitching and the deeper strategy of the game it becomes very entertaining. The same can be said on the hitting side, a lot is going on with every pitch if you look past the surface level. Baseball isn't boring, it's just slow paced and we live in a world today where everything is about instant gratification. For me the slow pace makes baseball more tense than any other sport.
Before your analysis, my immediate reaction was thinking, "TV frame rate does not allow us to accurately capture the exact timing that the ball reaches the glove" so glad to see that my brain cells do not get fooled by something like this
I think you made an excellent point when you brought up the fact this segment was on *MLB* Network by someone who played professionally. As you said, if I saw something like this done by espn or somebody not as invested in the sport, it would be easier to give them the benefit of the doubt for their flawed breakdown. If the MLB really wishes to drive interest, they would better off investing in people & personalities that offer fun and thought provoking takes on the sport with statistics & evidence to back them up. You've proven on your channels, that these new age metrics don't have to be weird or confusing to everyday fans if they're presented in a fun & entertaining way.
Great video! One point I think you could have hit on harder was the Jeff Frye tweet about the radar guns being "juiced". There has been extensive progress in the technology used in baseball (hence the statcast era). How would anyone benefit from the radar guns or cameras being off and giving higher readings? The technology itself just improves and gets better which we can also see from the increase of video frame rates, but he thinks MLB would rather implement stadium-wide hardware that's somehow worse than the technology available 20 years ago when he was still an active player... (had to edit 15 years to 20 years because his last year was 2001)
Asking for merch like that kinda goes against the whole point of this video. He’s saying Babe Ruth was great in his time, just like all the pitchers shown were. There’s no reason to compare them to today’s players, any player today could go and crush any pitcher back then, but none of Babe Ruth’s contemporaries could do what he did.
This really shows the difference between your everyday video editor and a true cinematographer or videographer, the understanding of how the optics and physics work!
If you watch the full clip Darling explains that the radar guns they used back in the day measured when it reached the plate not out of the hand like they do today, so when it actually reaches the plate it’s a little slower
Great job. Not even halfway through, and yet you've now hit on what I considered the most glaring flaw in the MLB Network analysis. At 7:36... "It looks like Randy Johnson has already thrown the ball, it looks like the ball has already left his hand. And it looks like it hasn't for Cole." During the first few minutes of this video, that was my IMMEDIATE reaction to Ripken's analysis. At one point (about 3:26 in Bailey's video), Ripken pauses his split screen to show that they're synced up. "It's almost identical," he says. But look where he pauses it. The pitchers' hands are still back behind their ears. It's NOT where the release point was. Then when they start playing the video, you can see with the naked eye that Moose is still slightly ahead of Ohtani. No frame-by-frame analysis is necessary there, Mussina and Ohtani were not close to being synced up. A little fast and loose with the word "identical." Not for nothing, but this is precisely why the Finish Lynx cameras capture images at thousands of frames per second. I think they might even be in the tens of thousands.
Holy schnikeys... that comparison with Olympic world records. I'm so proud! In my profession, I work with a lot of different sports, including swimming and track & field. And I frequently point to the progression of records in those sports because they illustrate the combined results of training techniques, nutrition and equipment. If those sports can see such dramatic upticks, I frequently posit, then why wouldn't we see them in stick-and-ball sports? And we do. e.g. compare the size of NFL offensive linemen now versus their counterparts 40 years ago. It's a combination of training, nutrition and equipment. The three have collectively allowed those players to become bigger, stronger and more agile than their forefathers in the game. As the data piles up, we're going to see similar trends from the NFL combine (which will in turn give us even more appreciation for how fast Champ Bailey was.) So yeah, why wouldn't pitching speeds be higher now than 20 years ago? Or 30? The 96-mph Ricky Vaughn heater from Major League and Nuke LaLoosh's 96 in Bull Durham will one day sound pretty quaint. ("How much?" "96." "No worries, we can work on that.")
@@6thwilbury2331 except those sports didn’t see “dramatic upticks” at all. Like at all. Literally the opposite. They’ve seen extremely minuscule upticks and most of those are attributed to equipment, field/court/track quality and improved “supplements”. You don’t sound like you know anything about this topic at all.
Apparently it takes a 90, 95 and 100 MPH pitch all 400 milliseconds to travel the distance to get to the plate? That based on googled myriad of answers to three distinct questions. That can’t be right though, can someone math that for me?
Okay, so let's say hypothetically, the segment is right (which it's not), how do you explain the aveage bullpen throwing harder, now? They only showed ELITE pitchers. The average bullpen back in the 90s threw 80s to low 90s.
What? It’s the same thing dummy. The radar guns used to measure velocity is different. Either that or Barry Bonds was only great because he was facing beer leaguers.
3:17 it feels like their editor doesn't know how what point to sync (or has a bias). I paused the Randy Johnson/Gerrit Cole clip and the ball left Randy's hand a hair earlier. 138.867 fps for Johnson, 143.733 fps for Cole using listed velo. Therefore Randy's fb gets to home in 0.4357 seconds vs Cole's 0.4216 seconds. Meaning if the sync was off by just 0.0141 seconds the visual comparison is thrown off. I'm seeing the same thing with Ohtani and Mussina. That being said, though, the numbers aren't always consistent between eras because of changes in testing methods and equipment. That's more of a broad observation, I think the examples they used would be close enough in time to correct for that.
Kyle Hendricks has a sub-90 fastball and was 9th in Cy Young voting last year. Jamie Moyer was throwing mid-80s when he was young and there are guys in the MLB throwing similar velocity today. If you throw mid-80s with extremely good control, you absolutely can still get drafted
I agree with part of your analysis, but I don’t agree players are better than they were before. For example, Jacob deGrom can throw 99.2 MPH on average, but can do so for only 90-100 pitches and 180-200 innings. Do you think deGrom’s and other pitchers’ velocity would be that high if he had to carry Randy Johnson’s workload, let alone Bob Gibson’s? Players play the game in different eras. There are advantages and disadvantages that come with every era. You could say that players from the ‘60’s or ‘80’s couldn’t catch up to deGrom or Cole. Let’s see how fast they would throw if they had to start 35 games and complete 28 of them. Players from past eras would struggle in today’s game. But players used to today’s game wouldn’t last a full season if they played the style they played in 1965 or 1992.
This is my first video seeing the legend behind "Foolish Baseball" and you somehow look nothing like I imagined and yet somehow you look exactly as I imagined. Consider me subscribed.
This is so good, Bailey! Also, to your last point, that’s exactly why it drives me insane when people compare Michael Jordan and LeBron James. They played in different eras and should be compared to their peers, not each other. Perfect assessment.
It feels like MLB has a problem with fetishizing the past. The game is surrounded by all these people from bygone eras, and they don't want to accept the idea that the game has progressed. They want to believe that the game is the same as it was 30 years ago or 100 years ago. They want to believe that the game is the game and it is some immutable law that is the same and always will be the same. They want to believe that if you put all of the great players from the past in today's game, they would still be great. Ironically, what is probably true is that if you took great players of the past and brought them up in the same way that players today are brought up, many of them would probably still be great (because of raw physical talent or work ethic or any number of other intangibles that made them great to begin with), but they would be great in a different way because today's game is different.
100 percent agree, this is the epitome of an old man yelling at his cloud, however, I think there are 2 more things to support your argument. 1) look at the first comparison, especially where the ball ends up for each pitcher (dead center compared to High and inside), even as a C- Geometry student in High School I understand that the Hypotenuse of each pitch is different, and that the adjusted difference of each will not effect the velocity of the pitch, but rather the time it takes to cross the plate (like a car racing on flat ground against a car going up or down a hill trying to reach the same place). 2) there seems to be no evidence or argument that these guys are even throwing the same pitches, totally throwing out the scientific method the segment wants to manipulate to get people to buy in.
I feel like the main reason that sort of "pitchers throw the same velo as back in the good ol days" is because they have a confirmation bias as to how they used to play the game was the "right way" to play. Ripken is essentially saying "the velo is the same yet all these batters have bad avgs, but we faced the same velo and had great avgs. Guys now days just have a bad approach" to confirm that the way the old guys played baseball is the right way by using misleading evidence and a terrible narrative. I remember initially watching this video and thinking "huh that's weird? and also doesn't make any sense" it just didn't add up, but this video definitely cleared the air.
Honestly, as a 21 year old, I’m super excited to see where the MLB will be at 10, 20, 30 years from now ability wise. Like how crazy good can pitchers get?
13 frames/(30 frames per second) = .43s Ball traveling 60ft / 0.43s = 138 ft/s or 94.4 miles/hr 12 frames/(30 frames per second) = .40 s Ball traveling 60ft / 0.40= 150 ft/s or 102.3 miles/hr 14 frames/(30 frames per second) = .47 s Ball traveling 60ft / 0.47= 127.6 ft/s or 87.0 miles/hr If Billy Ripken fudged the frames it by even 1 frame he could have made 87 look like 102
I actually saw this segment before i saw your video and thats why I clicked! While I was watching it i knew there was something off about what he was trying to portray. I kept saying to myself. But the numbers are there! 99 does not look like 94 even if a guy is an inch or two taller. It didnt make sense when I was watching it and i didnt know why! Appreciate the video!
The real head scratcher is how they don’t talk about the difference in how radar guns were used to measure velocity. Back in the day they’d clock speed at the plate, now it’s speed out of hand. Don’t remember off the top of my head but I think it’s about 5-7 mph difference. I would imagine this changed sometime in the 90s, so it wouldn’t effect the clips they used, but if you’re going to use video why not use ones from before the change, talk about it to back your point, and then do the dumb ass video line up. It’s like nobody did any kind of homework on this goofy narrative they’re trying to push
Have you ever watched the baseball documentary, "Fastball"? They actually calculated how fast someone like Nolan Ryan was throwing. SInce it was measured in front of home plate, they estimated he was throwing about 108.5 MPH out of the hand. Bob Feller threw about 107.6 MPH. I'm not sure when they started measuring out of the hand rather than about 10 FT in front of home plate, but if Johnson's fastball was being measured close to home plate, he was probably throwing 99-101 MPH rather than 94 MPH.
I recall this difference to be 2-3 mph. Whether it is 2-3 mph or 5-7 mph, the general point still stands. I still agree with Bailey that this "analysis" by mlb network is very bad.
i watched the segment live and just found it ludicrous that they all took it seriously and never questioned the frames per second or possible errors in the comparison process!
Disney just picked up the kid who fixed the Mark Hamill de-age for Mandalorian and MLB would be smart to follow suit and pick up people like you. Really enjoy the balanced take and fair analyses. Keep it up!
Arguing that a change in approach has had an equal effect as increased velocity on falling batting averages, something you even admit is true to a degree, is *not* suggesting that hitters have gotten worse (and only somewhat downplaying the effect of velocity and only because he was fooled by those flawed video comparisons). Many of them are simply using their talents in a different way by trading batting average (and even on-base percentage somewhat) for better power numbers (and more strikeouts).
2:35: Johnson clearly releases the ball before Gerrit Cole. I don't even know how they looked at this side by side and thought the release was at the same time
I could be completely wrong here but I’ve read about how differences in tech in speed guns over the years can affect readings and that a few mile per hour difference comparing pitches 20-30 years apart is pretty difficult
A fun question for Billy Ripken would be if he thinks making contact on a 95 mph pitch and sending it out of the the park is the same as swinging and missing the baseball by 4 and a half feet.
Glad to see this video. Something needed to be said about that report and how utterly false and inaccurate it is. Its shitting on the stars of today and MLB should be doing everything in their power to promote and support these guys.
Great breakdown. Didn't know this channel existed, I'll give you a follow. Bottom line this is a HORRIBLE WAY to compare velocity/MPH. Must've been a slow day in the studio.
very good analysis bailey! I have mixed feelings about MLB Network and their personalities. I used to love them as a kid but as I have grown older and gained a better understand of the game their takes can feel outdated and ignorant.
Oh please. He wanted to make a point that he knew was incorrect, and MLB Network made sure to provide him with the right video "proof" in order for him to do so.
Very well said and eloquently explained. I also don’t blame Ripken for his misunderstandings about video frames and technology. But MLB Network airing this segment doesn’t surprise me. So many American sports thrive on a promise of nostalgia. NFL Films and 30 for 30 and the like all push this narrative that the sports they’re promoting were great - if not better - in the “good old days.” So it doesn’t surprise me that MLB Network would air a segment with the thesis statement that the new era of pitching isn’t “better” and that we’re freaking out over nothing.
I’m not a video guy so I didn’t even think about the flaws of frame rates. But it was clear as day to me that they weren’t synced. He compared their windups not their actual releases
I don’t blame Ripken here, a lot of these guys don’t understand video and frames, and he was probably watching side-by-sides initially when he had that idea, and when asking his video analyst to match frames and he watched it, it made total sense to him. Not his fault, it’s just that he doesn’t understand frames and such.
When you get pinned by the goat
Still don't know if that excuses him completely ignoring the radar gun, the tool designed specifically to measure speed
@Benedict "Ben" Conway lets go flyers!!
@@rudinah8547 A fastball that leaves the pitcher’s hand at 95mph could drop to 86mph once it reaches the plate, so depending on where the radar gun is aimed, you could get a different result. Nowadays of course, it’s standardized across all ballparks at all levels so no problem.
@@floridaman6281 you're right, I get that radar guns could have inconsistencies too. Seems like he didn't realise he was just picking one inconsistency over another
Baseball’s media strategy of intentionally belittling its players and their accomplishments is mind-boggling to me. How the hell is any of that stuff helping grow interest in any aspect of the game? It’s infuriating
No one is allowed to be better than the guys I saw when I was a kid
Tom Koehler who was a pitcher for the Marlins for years said the same thing. He said why does MLB constantly hate on new players while glorifying old players? It's insane. I stopped watching MLB network.
Oldheads gonna oldhead
That is a huuuge problem with media covering baseball and the MLB itself not promoting they players and products properly, all that said it is even worst from guys such as Billy Ripken and Steven A Wright , I most of the time take what either one of them say with a ton of salt and scepticism, now with "Baldy" it goes further than egregious with some of the things he says and presents, keep in mind he is on payroll for a Network that covers ONLY baseball, most people are already aware that the ESPN coverage of baseball is appalling and do not fret about it that much but..... Ripken... and some other guys over there. Some comments already here on point: "Sometimes when Billy Ripken talks I zone out"
TL:DR ESPN sucks, so does some MLB network content, stick/switch to independent creators/commentators.
16:38 Steven A. Wright & Billy Ripken = haters.
For his next trick, Billy will doctor some stats to prove he actually had the better career of the two Ripken brothers.
Cal Ripken Jr. grounded into over FOUR times as many double plays as Billy. Really makes you question who the better player was...
@@n00b2b3r definitely still Cal
@@n00b2b3r What a lovely use of statistics :)
i think this segment is an excuse to explain why he had a nice 69 career ops+
@@adrnaline He had a better pitching career than Cal too. Billy came in during the time the O's lost like 29-2 against the Rangers and didnt do any worse than anyone else.
It was obvious some of the clips were out of sync on their end. The Stroman and Glasnow part cracked me up man lmaooooo
lmao the Musina Ohtani one Moose released it so much sooner then Ohtani. this whole segment was probably inspired by a bunch of guys doing coke in a room watching film
I can’t believe MLB Network thought this segment made sense. Have we gotten to the point where we are now rejecting mph because it “looks the same” when we’re watching it on TV?? It is an absolute fact that one guy is throwing faster than another. Sure there’s something to be said about arm angles, stride, height, etc. but it’s absolutely ridiculous that they would just ignore the mph difference. I can’t even.
i mean this is kind of disingenuous, the whole thing that lots of old guys say is that "oh the radar guns are different now, they're not actually throwing harder, we can just measure more accurately now"
whether or not there's any merit to that argument, idk if we'll ever know for certain; we can't go back into the past. but oldheads like Ripken and the guys at the Network keep wanting to try and prove it, and this was just a really dumb attempt and proving themselves right. very very dumb, actually, but not because they're arguing MPH; that's the entire point they're making, that the MPHs of the ball aren't different, but the radar gun spits out a different reading of MPH nowadays
What they did is like having 6'0" person stand next to a 6'2" person, then having a person 100 feet away say who is taller. "Oh they look the same height to me" lol.
One thing that is stupid...why use miles per hour? Feet per second would make so much more sense. Miles per hour on a pitch that will travel the length of a driveway in 1 second.
@@davidrafferty2491 my guess is it's easier for most people to visualize than feet per second. We all drive in MPH.
@@swirvinbirds1971 But how many of us routinely drive 90+ mph? Little league pitchers can throw the ball at highway speeds. And it's not like we have an understanding of what mph means over short distances. We know things like "it takes 15 minutes to get to the store going 30mph" or "it takes 2 hours to get to the beach going 60mph". But how long does it take to drive to your neighbor's house at 100mph? It's basically instantaneous. Doesn't really provide much intuitive understanding even if you can mathematically understand that going 100mph will get you there faster than going 95mph. But if you tell someone that a pitcher throws 150 feet per second, they could understand that at that speed they could walk to their neighbor's house in under half a second, and that is very intuitive.
Fantastic video. Did not have the tech to break it down like you did, but even when I watched it I couldn't get over the whole "eyeball it guys doesn't it look the same". Really appreciated your larger point as well about MLBN. Watching a lot of their segments they're so disconnected with how the game is played today and as someone who wants to see baseball promoted well, it's sad that this is the flagship network for the league.
MLB tonight to get the look ins and quick pitch for the recap are about the only watchable things on the network now. MLB tonight can actually be really good it just depends if like Pedro is on or not lol
Randy Johnson is like 7 feet tall how is that a fair comparison
hes so close to the plate its unfair against cole whos like 6'4
@@tela-vgaming4793 exactly, randy Johnson only has to throw the ball 4 feet since he can reach so far
because i said so
@@CadChamberlain yes
Bc height has literally nothing to do with it that’s how
And this is why teams use high speed cameras for pitchers you need insane FPS to pick up actual info. Maybe someone in MLB networks film room should inform their host
This is why every cable sports channel is losing sleep over people like you and jomboy
We choosin’ to rock with Bailey!
True - Jomboy, BDE, Urinating Tree, and FB are doing more for keeping baseball relevant than ESPN, Fox, and MLB could dream of.
Lmao so true
@@zealdrive BDE?
@@zealdrive oh shoot baseball doesn’t exist never mind lmao
Every time I heard “no agenda” I kept wanting to say “but wakko doesn’t even have a genda!”
What I really like about you Bailey is your reluctance to try and go for the home run with your analysis and instead give a balanced and rational view of the game while still maintaining a clear enthusiasm. Honestly so many guys in your role would feel such pressure to bow to the standard form of analysis but you’re doing your thing and I’m here for it all the way. Great video.
I think he pretty well eviscerates the people responsible at the end there.
Cleveland really missed out on renaming themselves the spiders and having that logo on their cap
And now we have the Guardians 🤮.
Love the Spiders hat. Missed opportunity, Cleveland.
I’m glad you made your bed for this vid :)
Each mph is said to be 3-4 inches by batters sometimes. For instance, missing a changeup by a foot means you swung at an 89 mph pitch instead of an 85 mph pitch. Randy Johnson's pitches would look 2mph faster based on his release point.
This gave me a great idea for the MLB. High speed, like 500-1000 fps cameras that record the top pitchers pitches and show off the best ones. Imagine showing a 2500 rpm ball in super slow mo. It could make for some great and easy content for the league and open up genuine talks of frame by frame analysis. You know every team already has one or two of these cameras already
Bailey said WAKANDA FOREVER in the thumbnail #Respek
My friend Fuzzy
When's mlb recap coming out
Foolkandka Forever
NO AGENDA!
Hey fuzz
When I was watching this I was saying how inaccurate it was bc of your Willie Mays catch vid where you talked about the inaccuracies of video from years ago and how it’s impossible to tell how much time passed bc of that.
Assuming the pitcher throws the ball exactly 60.5 feet away from home, a ball traveling 100mph would need 6050 frames of video available to make an accurate judgement. This means, you'd need approximately 18000 frames of video to correctly judge this (100mph takes about 400ms to reach home plate in baseball). Basically, this segment is working with a margin of error equivalent to that of using a pound of butter when the recipe calls for a teaspoon.
I appreciate Bailey for being rational nostalgia glasses are a crazy powerful thing
A segment like this getting cleared for a live TV broadcast is crazy
I feel bad for Billy Ripken sometimes. To him, big bro was always the better of the brothers. His brother got their dad's name, he got the star shortstop role that Billy wanted, he got the HOF plaque. Billy Ripken pulled off a Mathis twice in his career while being an average defender, he probably wanted to "earn" his spot in the majors, but always felt like it was being handed to him simply because of his brothers prowess and not his performance. Meanwhile fans were pointing that out even when he was doing great.
In 1987 for the entirety of the season, 22 yr old piss poor player Billy Ripken started at 2B, 27 yr old superstar Cal Ripken Jr. started at SS, and up and coming manager Cal Ripken Sr. managed the Orioles.
Billy Ripken was always behind in life, but Billy, this segment doesn't prove that you won't be behind another fastball.
The fact that he's like 55 years old does.
Learn to write punchlines, kid.
Fully understanding that Babe Ruth never saw a slider is one of those “my whole life almost feels like a lie” moments.
He also only face white US pitchers...
@@sergiol652 It’s a good thing he never had to listen to English like your’s
We he also was played when the dead ball era had ended which forced pitchers adapted. One could say that Babe changed the game in everyway
@@bloodwrage ummm your’s 🤣
@@bloodwrage Ironically, bad English, and completely besides the point.
LOVE THIS ENERGY. The way you end it is so important. We should be building each other up. The only reason there are kids in high school throwing 95 now is because of the advancements made by people before them. Jack Leiter, great example. His dad learned a LOT about pitching he was one of the best for his time. The information his dad learned was passed on to him, plus all the technological advancements make it possible for him to be throwing mid 90's consistently before ever even leaving college ball.
Truthfully retired players should be proud of how the game is evolving. Their efforts, growth and knowledge made improvements to the game possible.
The analysis MLB Network needs, but doesn't want.
But what’s YOUR agenda, Bailey?
😳🤔
The official agenda is detailed in the degrom video - the ocean!
B I T S
Only what is best in life. To crush his enemies, see their stats driven before him, and to hear the lamentation of their networks.
Your point at 5:50 is exacerbated by ghosting which Alex in edit doesn’t seem to grasp.
This guy really thinks we didn’t watch the Chris Davis video the minute it came out
Did Ripken even imagine how insulting he was to the engineers and the courts (for speeding tickets) that created and rely on the speed measuring technologies? To him: they’ve been making up the results the WHOLE TIME.
Except they do make up the results the whole time for legal measurements. Just look at the difference in breathalyzers, and how cops are allowed to "estimate" your speed and then put their estimate down on the ticket saying it was gunned.
Its kind of offensive to the most basic level of thought that you trust these people to actually do a good job.
I was pulling my damn hair out watching this segment live. This segment came off as a big hit piece against new era players to me. God bless you Foolish
i’m so tired of watching boomers talk about baseball with no understanding of the game today
why is Billy Ripken talking about approaches at the plate, he’s a career .247 hitter lmao. and in his prime he was mainly used as a sac bunter 😂😂
But he had a really great baseball card lol
He is in the 1 % of the .0000001% in human history so 247 is pretty incredible
@@mikecha3002 Not in comparison to his peers.
Love the Cleveland Spiders hat!
Spiders > Guardians!!
@@maxgreineder9867 they are easily better tenfold. Guardians has no roots, spiders and rocks (rockers, just something with rock and roll HOF) would’ve made so much sense
@@pohorex6834 I'm guessing that they wanted to keep a theme with Native American people, because I think the guardian mascot will be a Native American, but I don't know. Rockers is awesome, but I will always want spiders
@@maxgreineder9867 they won’t keep Native American at all, that’s the issue, is that some culture presumes that any sort of representation of a minority culture is derogatory, even though it was meant to represent the first ever Native American player in the MLB. They aren’t keeping anything Native American, nothing close to it
Missed opportunity. The sweet gear alone would've been worth calling them the Spiders.
Glad you covered this. I was scratching my head when i originally saw this segment
It's wonderful to see this guy's passion for the sport. So smart too. Articulate. Why isn't this guy on MLB?
As far as a faster fastball=better pitcher. It's one metric. See Adam Wainwright pitch. You probably won't see more than a few pitches over 90 MPH but damn...that's a whole other kind of better pitcher. This is why such a "boring" sport like baseball is infinitely and enduringly interesting.
Poetry
Absolutely. One of the last true control freaks. You definitely have to give some small part of that credit to Yadi as his batterymate, making sure the ump sees things their way.
Because Bailey is too smart for the meatheads on MLB Network.
Baseball is only boring because only 10 minutes worth of stuff happens in a 3 hour game.
Unless you're the kind of psycho that likes watching the 3 true outcomes.
@@bubba200874426 If the only things you considered to be "stuff" are home runs and run scoring hits then yeah. But there's a lot more going on than that. Every single pitch is part of a battle between the hitter and pitcher. If you learn to appreciate good pitching and the deeper strategy of the game it becomes very entertaining. The same can be said on the hitting side, a lot is going on with every pitch if you look past the surface level. Baseball isn't boring, it's just slow paced and we live in a world today where everything is about instant gratification. For me the slow pace makes baseball more tense than any other sport.
“Late one night”
Nah Bailey this is MLB Central the WORST MORNING SHOW ON TELEVISION.
It’s so bad it crazy
Before your analysis, my immediate reaction was thinking, "TV frame rate does not allow us to accurately capture the exact timing that the ball reaches the glove" so glad to see that my brain cells do not get fooled by something like this
I think you made an excellent point when you brought up the fact this segment was on *MLB* Network by someone who played professionally. As you said, if I saw something like this done by espn or somebody not as invested in the sport, it would be easier to give them the benefit of the doubt for their flawed breakdown.
If the MLB really wishes to drive interest, they would better off investing in people & personalities that offer fun and thought provoking takes on the sport with statistics & evidence to back them up. You've proven on your channels, that these new age metrics don't have to be weird or confusing to everyday fans if they're presented in a fun & entertaining way.
Great video! One point I think you could have hit on harder was the Jeff Frye tweet about the radar guns being "juiced". There has been extensive progress in the technology used in baseball (hence the statcast era). How would anyone benefit from the radar guns or cameras being off and giving higher readings? The technology itself just improves and gets better which we can also see from the increase of video frame rates, but he thinks MLB would rather implement stadium-wide hardware that's somehow worse than the technology available 20 years ago when he was still an active player... (had to edit 15 years to 20 years because his last year was 2001)
Bailey, I'm going to be needing some, "He Never Saw a Slider" Merch ASAP
Asking for merch like that kinda goes against the whole point of this video. He’s saying Babe Ruth was great in his time, just like all the pitchers shown were. There’s no reason to compare them to today’s players, any player today could go and crush any pitcher back then, but none of Babe Ruth’s contemporaries could do what he did.
This really shows the difference between your everyday video editor and a true cinematographer or videographer, the understanding of how the optics and physics work!
Very interesting analysis....I knew Billy was wrong but this makes sense why it looks like it gets there the same.
I would be interested to see the aerodynamics of baseballs traveling 10 MPH different, say 90-100MPH at the same spin rate.
10:20 I was already thinking of Glasnow/Stroman before you picked those examples. Gotta be the most well known tall guy and short guy pitchers.
If you watch the full clip Darling explains that the radar guns they used back in the day measured when it reached the plate not out of the hand like they do today, so when it actually reaches the plate it’s a little slower
Thank you, people don't understand how Frame rate and video actually work. And have been waiting for someone to throw facts on this video.
Love your thought process on all these Bailey. Quality as always
man big ups @foolishbailey ! love it when you giving intuitive descriptions of stuff like margin of error on frame rate
7:20 Bob Gibson producing the best sword I’ve ever seen, what a legend
Thank god u brought up extension, randy Johnson’s long arms give the illusion of throwing harder cause he’s closer
We’ve been hoodwinked, bamboozled, lead astray, run amok and flat out deceived - Stephen A. Smith
Great job. Not even halfway through, and yet you've now hit on what I considered the most glaring flaw in the MLB Network analysis. At 7:36... "It looks like Randy Johnson has already thrown the ball, it looks like the ball has already left his hand. And it looks like it hasn't for Cole."
During the first few minutes of this video, that was my IMMEDIATE reaction to Ripken's analysis. At one point (about 3:26 in Bailey's video), Ripken pauses his split screen to show that they're synced up. "It's almost identical," he says. But look where he pauses it. The pitchers' hands are still back behind their ears. It's NOT where the release point was. Then when they start playing the video, you can see with the naked eye that Moose is still slightly ahead of Ohtani. No frame-by-frame analysis is necessary there, Mussina and Ohtani were not close to being synced up. A little fast and loose with the word "identical."
Not for nothing, but this is precisely why the Finish Lynx cameras capture images at thousands of frames per second. I think they might even be in the tens of thousands.
Holy schnikeys... that comparison with Olympic world records. I'm so proud! In my profession, I work with a lot of different sports, including swimming and track & field. And I frequently point to the progression of records in those sports because they illustrate the combined results of training techniques, nutrition and equipment. If those sports can see such dramatic upticks, I frequently posit, then why wouldn't we see them in stick-and-ball sports?
And we do. e.g. compare the size of NFL offensive linemen now versus their counterparts 40 years ago. It's a combination of training, nutrition and equipment. The three have collectively allowed those players to become bigger, stronger and more agile than their forefathers in the game. As the data piles up, we're going to see similar trends from the NFL combine (which will in turn give us even more appreciation for how fast Champ Bailey was.)
So yeah, why wouldn't pitching speeds be higher now than 20 years ago? Or 30?
The 96-mph Ricky Vaughn heater from Major League and Nuke LaLoosh's 96 in Bull Durham will one day sound pretty quaint. ("How much?" "96." "No worries, we can work on that.")
@@6thwilbury2331 except those sports didn’t see “dramatic upticks” at all. Like at all. Literally the opposite. They’ve seen extremely minuscule upticks and most of those are attributed to equipment, field/court/track quality and improved “supplements”. You don’t sound like you know anything about this topic at all.
Watched about 2-3 minutes and I already know where this segment is going. Oh geez. Thank you for the coverage Bailey.
Apparently it takes a 90, 95 and 100 MPH pitch all 400 milliseconds to travel the distance to get to the plate? That based on googled myriad of answers to three distinct questions. That can’t be right though, can someone math that for me?
Okay, so let's say hypothetically, the segment is right (which it's not), how do you explain the aveage bullpen throwing harder, now? They only showed ELITE pitchers. The average bullpen back in the 90s threw 80s to low 90s.
What? It’s the same thing dummy. The radar guns used to measure velocity is different. Either that or Barry Bonds was only great because he was facing beer leaguers.
Does anyone understand that the radar gun wasn’t as accurate back then?
3:17 it feels like their editor doesn't know how what point to sync (or has a bias). I paused the Randy Johnson/Gerrit Cole clip and the ball left Randy's hand a hair earlier. 138.867 fps for Johnson, 143.733 fps for Cole using listed velo. Therefore Randy's fb gets to home in 0.4357 seconds vs Cole's 0.4216 seconds. Meaning if the sync was off by just 0.0141 seconds the visual comparison is thrown off. I'm seeing the same thing with Ohtani and Mussina.
That being said, though, the numbers aren't always consistent between eras because of changes in testing methods and equipment. That's more of a broad observation, I think the examples they used would be close enough in time to correct for that.
Jamie Moyer wouldn't get drafted these days. And this is a guy who pitched for 25 years and retired only 9 years ago.
He probably would have, but he would have floundered in the minors for like 10 years.
Jamie Moyer had more pitch ability than Gerrit Cole.
Kyle Hendricks has a sub-90 fastball and was 9th in Cy Young voting last year. Jamie Moyer was throwing mid-80s when he was young and there are guys in the MLB throwing similar velocity today. If you throw mid-80s with extremely good control, you absolutely can still get drafted
People who can get outs at the MLB level throwing 85 are as much of an outlier as guys throwing 100
yu darvish also averages like 91 and gets outs lol
The analysis we all needed. It's always funny when some old heads try to use technology to make a point and just make themselves look silly
I wish I could like this video more than once I appreciate your attention to details and Analytics. Great video man
7:30 45's arm is moving so fast on that frame that it got scanned in to a weird tentacle!
I agree with part of your analysis, but I don’t agree players are better than they were before.
For example, Jacob deGrom can throw 99.2 MPH on average, but can do so for only 90-100 pitches and 180-200 innings.
Do you think deGrom’s and other pitchers’ velocity would be that high if he had to carry Randy Johnson’s workload, let alone Bob Gibson’s?
Players play the game in different eras. There are advantages and disadvantages that come with every era. You could say that players from the ‘60’s or ‘80’s couldn’t catch up to deGrom or Cole. Let’s see how fast they would throw if they had to start 35 games and complete 28 of them.
Players from past eras would struggle in today’s game. But players used to today’s game wouldn’t last a full season if they played the style they played in 1965 or 1992.
yeah, my first thought about this was...they're on shittier recording equipment lol
In a game of inches...
All I’m saying is, I’ve never seen the Grouch and Billy Ripken in the same room...
Cable sports channels cater to old men. Old men love reminiscing about the glory days especially when they hate modern players for political reasons.
omg the Stroman-Glasnow vid compare was awesome. Great video. Great ending. Thank you.
The guy couldn't even eyeball the right bat to pose with for his trading card. He had no chance.
dude i haven’t watched the video yet but you’re just awesome. keep it going my man
This is my first video seeing the legend behind "Foolish Baseball" and you somehow look nothing like I imagined and yet somehow you look exactly as I imagined. Consider me subscribed.
This is so good, Bailey! Also, to your last point, that’s exactly why it drives me insane when people compare Michael Jordan and LeBron James. They played in different eras and should be compared to their peers, not each other. Perfect assessment.
It feels like MLB has a problem with fetishizing the past. The game is surrounded by all these people from bygone eras, and they don't want to accept the idea that the game has progressed. They want to believe that the game is the same as it was 30 years ago or 100 years ago. They want to believe that the game is the game and it is some immutable law that is the same and always will be the same. They want to believe that if you put all of the great players from the past in today's game, they would still be great. Ironically, what is probably true is that if you took great players of the past and brought them up in the same way that players today are brought up, many of them would probably still be great (because of raw physical talent or work ethic or any number of other intangibles that made them great to begin with), but they would be great in a different way because today's game is different.
100 percent agree, this is the epitome of an old man yelling at his cloud, however, I think there are 2 more things to support your argument. 1) look at the first comparison, especially where the ball ends up for each pitcher (dead center compared to High and inside), even as a C- Geometry student in High School I understand that the Hypotenuse of each pitch is different, and that the adjusted difference of each will not effect the velocity of the pitch, but rather the time it takes to cross the plate (like a car racing on flat ground against a car going up or down a hill trying to reach the same place). 2) there seems to be no evidence or argument that these guys are even throwing the same pitches, totally throwing out the scientific method the segment wants to manipulate to get people to buy in.
I feel like the main reason that sort of "pitchers throw the same velo as back in the good ol days" is because they have a confirmation bias as to how they used to play the game was the "right way" to play. Ripken is essentially saying "the velo is the same yet all these batters have bad avgs, but we faced the same velo and had great avgs. Guys now days just have a bad approach" to confirm that the way the old guys played baseball is the right way by using misleading evidence and a terrible narrative. I remember initially watching this video and thinking "huh that's weird? and also doesn't make any sense" it just didn't add up, but this video definitely cleared the air.
Honestly, as a 21 year old, I’m super excited to see where the MLB will be at 10, 20, 30 years from now ability wise. Like how crazy good can pitchers get?
13 frames/(30 frames per second) = .43s
Ball traveling 60ft / 0.43s = 138 ft/s or 94.4 miles/hr
12 frames/(30 frames per second) = .40 s
Ball traveling 60ft / 0.40= 150 ft/s or 102.3 miles/hr
14 frames/(30 frames per second) = .47 s
Ball traveling 60ft / 0.47= 127.6 ft/s or 87.0 miles/hr
If Billy Ripken fudged the frames it by even 1 frame he could have made 87 look like 102
I actually saw this segment before i saw your video and thats why I clicked! While I was watching it i knew there was something off about what he was trying to portray. I kept saying to myself. But the numbers are there! 99 does not look like 94 even if a guy is an inch or two taller. It didnt make sense when I was watching it and i didnt know why! Appreciate the video!
this is why i love john kruk. always quick to compliment the young guys and acknowledge the change in the game
the little hand gesture he makes when he (Billy) says "no agenda" @ 1:36ish is so odd to me lol
The real head scratcher is how they don’t talk about the difference in how radar guns were used to measure velocity. Back in the day they’d clock speed at the plate, now it’s speed out of hand. Don’t remember off the top of my head but I think it’s about 5-7 mph difference. I would imagine this changed sometime in the 90s, so it wouldn’t effect the clips they used, but if you’re going to use video why not use ones from before the change, talk about it to back your point, and then do the dumb ass video line up. It’s like nobody did any kind of homework on this goofy narrative they’re trying to push
Have you ever watched the baseball documentary, "Fastball"? They actually calculated how fast someone like Nolan Ryan was throwing. SInce it was measured in front of home plate, they estimated he was throwing about 108.5 MPH out of the hand. Bob Feller threw about 107.6 MPH. I'm not sure when they started measuring out of the hand rather than about 10 FT in front of home plate, but if Johnson's fastball was being measured close to home plate, he was probably throwing 99-101 MPH rather than 94 MPH.
I recall this difference to be 2-3 mph. Whether it is 2-3 mph or 5-7 mph, the general point still stands. I still agree with Bailey that this "analysis" by mlb network is very bad.
Darling spent like a minute discussing it in the segment
It’s not as great as 5-7 mph, it’s more like 2-3 mph difference.
Alternate video title “Foolish Bailey takes the bait” 😂😂😂
i watched the segment live and just found it ludicrous that they all took it seriously and never questioned the frames per second or possible errors in the comparison process!
Disney just picked up the kid who fixed the Mark Hamill de-age for Mandalorian and MLB would be smart to follow suit and pick up people like you. Really enjoy the balanced take and fair analyses. Keep it up!
Alternative title: old heads being old
Arguing that a change in approach has had an equal effect as increased velocity on falling batting averages, something you even admit is true to a degree, is *not* suggesting that hitters have gotten worse (and only somewhat downplaying the effect of velocity and only because he was fooled by those flawed video comparisons). Many of them are simply using their talents in a different way by trading batting average (and even on-base percentage somewhat) for better power numbers (and more strikeouts).
2:35: Johnson clearly releases the ball before Gerrit Cole. I don't even know how they looked at this side by side and thought the release was at the same time
I could be completely wrong here but I’ve read about how differences in tech in speed guns over the years can affect readings and that a few mile per hour difference comparing pitches 20-30 years apart is pretty difficult
A fun question for Billy Ripken would be if he thinks making contact on a 95 mph pitch and sending it out of the the park is the same as swinging and missing the baseball by 4 and a half feet.
dude. i just became a life-long fan of yours. keep going, great content.
Glad to see this video. Something needed to be said about that report and how utterly false and inaccurate it is. Its shitting on the stars of today and MLB should be doing everything in their power to promote and support these guys.
At 10:55 you mentioned not "syncing the video" while your audio was slightly out of sync with your video and it made me freak
Came back to this vid and this is a classic. Should've made it on Foolish Baseball
Great breakdown. Didn't know this channel existed, I'll give you a follow.
Bottom line this is a HORRIBLE WAY to compare velocity/MPH. Must've been a slow day in the studio.
very good analysis bailey! I have mixed feelings about MLB Network and their personalities. I used to love them as a kid but as I have grown older and gained a better understand of the game their takes can feel outdated and ignorant.
Oh please. He wanted to make a point that he knew was incorrect, and MLB Network made sure to provide him with the right video "proof" in order for him to do so.
I need to use this FPS argument to fight speeding tickets
god those intro waves were immaculate
Very well said and eloquently explained. I also don’t blame Ripken for his misunderstandings about video frames and technology. But MLB Network airing this segment doesn’t surprise me. So many American sports thrive on a promise of nostalgia. NFL Films and 30 for 30 and the like all push this narrative that the sports they’re promoting were great - if not better - in the “good old days.” So it doesn’t surprise me that MLB Network would air a segment with the thesis statement that the new era of pitching isn’t “better” and that we’re freaking out over nothing.
I’m not a video guy so I didn’t even think about the flaws of frame rates. But it was clear as day to me that they weren’t synced. He compared their windups not their actual releases
+ the velocity was measured closer to home plate back then than it is now
This is a very very good video Bailey. Thanks for making it.