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Knicks Morning News (2025.08.05)
08/05/2025 11:00:04
08/05/2025 10:00:00
08/05/2025 07:19:00
08/05/2025 04:01:19
08/05/2025 03:06:42
08/05/2025 02:18:00
5 replies on “Knicks Morning News (2025.08.05)”
Not really. The Statcast versus old school radar gun difference is actually a thing (not sure why it’s being seemingly denied) and that’s not nostalgia talking, that’s Newton and Pascal talking.
David Peterson’s average four-seamer is 92.3 mph this year, measured out of the hand. Anything in the low 90s under either the old school “fast” or the old school “slow” radar guns is faster than that. If a guy threw “90” in 1965, he threw harder than David Peterson.
As to the numbers you gave us re Koufax, it really comes down to details. If he threw 91 on the “fast” gun, then yeah that’s probably something like 94-95 Statcast, which is nothing special. But if he threw 94 “slow” gun, that’s 98-99 Statcast, which would make his four-seamer the quickest (I think) of any 2025 starter in baseball.
Sandy Koufax is well before my time, but can I conceive of a cosmos in which he had a better four-seamer than Gerrit Cole? Absolutely yes. Did he in fact? Dunno.
I do know he missed a shit-ton of bats (*), which could have been mostly because of his 80-level curveball and I also know that dudes in 1965 could and did put enough exit velo on batted balls for them to go a very long way. But we’re being told at the same time that pitchers of that time *couldn’t* put modern “exit velos” on their pitches. Doesn’t really add up.
The velos that 2025 hitters face are way higher than the velos 1965 hitters faced, there’s no question about that and no one sane would argue otherwise. David Peterson throws significantly harder than the “David Peterson” of 1965. That doesn’t remotely mean David Peterson throws harder than the Sandy Koufax of 1965.
(*) In a pool of dudes who did practically anything they could to not strikeout, and were in part selected for the trait of not striking out. I mentioned the 1977 World Series Game 6 on the last thread because I watched it recently on YouTube. 99.99% sure Keith Jackson said one of the fastballs thrown by Yankee starter Mike Torrez fastballs was measured at 93. Assuming that was the “fast” gun, that’s Statcast 96-97. Mike Torrez was a below league-average strikeout guy.
Owen said,
That’s why I keep saying the real issue is whether people run faster, jump higher, throw faster, hit farther, swim faster etc.. because there is a much larger pool of human beings available to try to find elite athletes or whether it’s knowledge, nutition, training, sports medicine, starting out younger etc…
I believe it’s both but to different degrees depending on the sport.
If you believe that, then it’s likely a lot of lower tier professional athletes of the past would not cut it in the present even with modern advancement, but they probably would have run faster, jumped higher, hit father, thrown faster etc… than they did in their prime.
I see it in my own game.
I saw Mosconi, Lassiter, Crane, Siegel, Varner Mizerak, Reyes, etc.. play pool decades ago and I saw the level of their competition.
When Reyes came along he revolutionized the game of 9 ball with kicking and safety strategy.
Now I see Filler, Gorst, etc…
There are massively more great players now than in the past because the game is global, but you can’t compare them statistically to the past because the cue sticks have improved accuracy, the balls, cloths, and pocket size all changed and players are starting WAY younger with the benefit of learning on Youtube from great players instead of trial and error on their own.
If the great players of the past started as kids now with modern equipment and learning, they’d be better than they were in their primes, but there would be MANY more great players to compete against. So the tier below them years ago would drop away.
The argument has kinda gone astray from the original point, which is that some of us geezers think it’s kinda boring to see guys flailing away at 100mph 4-seamers an 90mph sliders/sweepers/cutters/sinkers/splitters from mostly generic starters and relievers in search of exit velocity and launch angle. It’s purely about aesthetics and tastes and preferences, and there’s no accounting for that.
Although it seems like the powers that be have recognized that aspects of the evolution of the game have had detrimental impacts on fan interest over the years. Massive rules/equipment changes were implemented (almost all geared to offense) to make it almost unrecognizable from the game played in the 1960’s, starting with lower mound and smaller strike zone, to the DH, to warnings and ejections for brushback pitches, to maple bats with hollowed out ends, to helmets and body armor that protect hitters who lean out over the plate, to outlawing the shift, pitch clocks, free runners, restricting mound visits and throw-overs, to torpedo bats. Throw in the newfangled nature of uniforms, stadiums, scoreboards, walk-up music, HR trots, and the lack of roster continuity, and there’s a lot of things to be nostalgic about. (the new stadiums and amenities are mostly a plus, so there’s that! From a Mets fan POV, Shea was a dump and Citi Field is awesome!))
But there is no debating the obvious truth that, as in most sports, the average baseball player is far, far superior to the average player back in the day. The training, equipment, and passing on of new technical skills has irrevocably changed the skill level in the sport. This is also true in football, basketball, hockey, tennis, golf, figure skating, you name it! Watching film of the olden days looks kinda comical, but at the time, it seemed beautiful and state of the art.
I would guess that the sport that has stayed truest to its original nature is soccer. Seems like the uniformity of the ball, field, and goal have limited what can be done to change things. Would love to hear from folks about this, since I am not a fan at all, not enough scoring for me and penalty kicks deciding critical games seems weird, as does not knowing how exactly much time is left.
*obviously the advent of artificial turf has been a factor in soccer, but beyond that, not much else, right?
I should also mention volleyball…the most massive change over the years was to add a defensive specialist called the libero who can remain in the back row continuously to somewhat rein in the offense.
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