I remember clearly my collegiate coach chirping at us pitchers daily about our overall stirke to ball ratio in our bullpen sessions during winter workouts.
The goal was 60%. Every time we took the mound. 60% strikes with two or more pitches and he said we’d win all the games we wanted as long as our defense would pick us up.
I’d always wondered why he’d picked this percentage as our goal.
Turns out, years later, he was right on with his percentage. In fact, for you number people (even if you’re not, don’t be scared, it’s delightfully interesting) I’ve found some good info.
Based on some serious statistical analysis, the average MLB pitcher threw 62% of his total pitches for strikes during the 2009 season.
Here are some highlights of the research I pulled from efastball.com
- The top Strike to-Ball Percentage was 69% thrown by 7 pitchers, 68% by 10 pitchers.
- 500 pitchers (of the 666 total MLB pitchers) threw strikes at least 60% of the time. 660 pitchers threw at least 48% strikes.
The research also digs into some popular pitchers’ strike to ball ratio as well. You can see the complete list here, but here are a handful.
Mariano Rivera – 67%
Justin Verlander – 67%
Roy Halladay – 69%
Felix Hernandez – 64%
The moral of the story then is that you’ve got to shoot for 60% strikes on the mound. This is particularly important at the high school level and above.
Not sure what you need to fix to achieve mastery of each pitch and that magic 60% ration? Grab our Pitching Grips 101 DVD now, we’ve dropped the price for “Nasty Grips Week”.
