Students build knuckleball pitching machine, still unable to duplicate path
Four University of Toronto engineering students built a knuckleball pitching machine. Even in highly controlled conditions, the path of the pitch is never the same.
By
Mike Axisa
•
2 min read
The knuckleball is one of the many things that make baseball so wonderfully unique. Knuckleballs are, by design, completely unpredictable. It's a pitch thrown with minimal spin so the seams of the baseball can interact with the air to create unpredictable movement. No two knuckleballs are alike.
This classic GIF of an R.A. Dickey knuckler shows just how incredible the knuckleball is:
Amazing. You can watch the GIF over and over and still expect the ball to move in a different direction each time. Imagine trying to hit that.
According to Brendan Kennedy of the Toronto Star, four mechanical engineering students at the University of Toronto set out to design and build the first pitching machine that could not only throw knuckeballs, but throw knuckleballs with repeatable trajectories.
“The idea was if we could control everything maybe we could get a knuckleball to be the exact same every time,” said Alex Gordon, one of the students (not the Royals left fielder). By controlling all the variables -- air pressure, release speed and slot, etc. -- they would be able to create a repeatable knuckleball. Right? Wrong.
Here's more from Kennedy:
“The amount of control you need to throw the same knuckleball every time is unbelievable,” said Martin Côté, who along with Gordon, Jessica Tomasi and Queenie Yuan built the prototype as part of their fourth-year design project — adapting a regular pitching machine with PVC tubes, motors and a series of sensors that modulated the velocity and automatically set the ball in the same orientation before every pitch.
“The mystery of the knuckleball prevailed over our efforts,” said Professor David Sinton, a baseball-loving mechanical engineer who came up with the idea and supervised the project.
...
The students found that even the slightest change in conditions — from a small scuff on the ball to the tiniest tilt in its orientation — changed the pitch’s behaviour. “One thing we learned about knuckleballs,” said Côté, “is that they’re so sensitive to everything. That’s why it’s really, really hard to throw the same one twice.”
At one point the students discussed building a bionic arm to throw the pitch, though that didn't happen. Even in an extremely controlled environment, the knuckleball did whatever it wanted. It's impossible to predict.
The hope was that even if the pitching machine couldn't throw repeatable knuckleballs, they would still be able to market it as a developmental tool for hitters as well as catchers. Unfortunately, Kennedy says there hasn't been much commercial interest. The knuckleball is too rare, and that's part of the reason why it is so fascinating.
