Are Baseball Pitchers Faster Today?
Hank Campbell
On September 7, 1974, pitching for the California Angels, Nolan Ryan, known for his velocity, became the first to have his pitch speed measured during a game. Rockwell International experts clocked the ball velocity at 100.8 miles per hour. That was the fastest pitch ever recorded. Yet last season over 50 pitchers in Major League Baseball threw 100 MPH and 140 more hit that velocity in the minor leagues. In September of 2010, Aroldis Chapman threw 105.1 MPH. Clearly, pitchers have gotten a lot f