RC+ Stat Stumper #4: Curveball Spin Rates

by — August 23, 2019 in Trivia

Welcome to RC+ Stat Stumper!

We’re taking a longtime ballpark tradition and giving it a  modern twist. At Great American Ball Park, the Scoreboard Stumper tests your knowledge of baseball history and you might learn a little bit about the Reds as well. The RC+ Stat Stumper is a weekly question about the Reds that involves a newer statistic.

We invite you to post your guesses in the comments (no looking up the answers, please). The correct answers and winners will be revealed prior to first pitch that day. Enjoy and thanks for playing!

RC+ Stat Stumper #4:

Our own Matt Wilkes recently wrote a great piece detailing the Reds elite spin rates for different pitches. One of those pitchers is Sonny Gray, who spins his curveball as well as any other pitcher in baseball. In fact, he has two seasons since 2015 that rank in the top 10 for highest RPMs on a curveball (min. 500 pitches). His current 2019 campaign is 2nd at 2,953 RPMs and last year ranks 8th at 2,852 RPMs.

Five other pitchers across the league have had multiple seasons since 2015 (min. 500 pitches) in the top 25 of highest spin rate on curveballs. Name those five pitchers.

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Matt Habel

Matthew Habel was born and mostly raised in Cincinnati and was always a Reds fan growing up. Ironically, he did not become die-hard until moving to Pittsburgh after college and experiencing the 2013 Wild Card game behind enemy lines. While the "Cueto Game" is one of the worst sports moments of his life, he became enamored with the analytics side of the game after reading Big Data Baseball and watching the Pirates organization end their postseason drought. He started writing for Redleg Nation in 2017 and has enjoyed continuously learning more about the sport. He currently lives in Portland, Oregon where he loves exploring the great outdoors. Find him on Twitter @MattadorHeyBull

11 Responses

  1. Matt Wilkes says:
    August 23, 2019 at 9:47 AM

    The 500 pitches threshold makes this one tough. I know of several relievers who are usually at the top of the list. Seth Lugo is the name that pops to mind. I believe he was a starter until a couple of years ago, so I’ll go with him. Aaron Sanchez may be one of them since that was a big reason the Astros traded for him. Wouldn’t shock me to see Gerrit Cole, Lance McCullers, or Charlie Morton up there either. So basically all Astros pitchers and Seth Lugo.

  2. Steve Mancuso says:
    August 23, 2019 at 12:55 PM

    Trevor Bauer … ?

  3. Steve Mancuso says:
    August 23, 2019 at 1:36 PM

    Bauer, Cole, Verlander, Morton and … Kershaw. Pure guesses.

  4. R Smith says:
    August 23, 2019 at 4:22 PM

    Kershaw/Wainwright/Morton/Bauer/Sabathia.

  5. Raul Acedo says:
    August 23, 2019 at 4:50 PM

    Kershaw, Kimbrel, Scherzer, Sale, Rich Hill (tough to leave out Kluber or old Arrienta)

  6. Matt Habel says:
    August 23, 2019 at 9:04 PM

    A tougher question but still some great guesses. The correct answers are:

    Rich Hill
    Charlie Morton
    Gio Gonzalez
    Stephen Strasburg
    Justin Verlander

    Thanks for playing. See you next week!

    • Matt Wilkes says:
      August 23, 2019 at 10:03 PM

      Ah, Strasburg was an obvious one we missed. Didn’t realize Gonzalez could spin it like that. Good question!

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