Major League Baseball

'Eephus' pitch & Darvish curveball cap nasty Sunday on mound

Updated Mar. 4, 2020 1:01 p.m. ET

share

facebookxredditlink

foxsports

If you're a fan of nasty pitches, Sunday was a good day for you.

Let's start in Japan, where a Pacific League baseball game briefly morphed into slow-pitch softball, thanks to Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters pitcher Kazuhito Tadano.

Tadano, who appeared in 15 games for the Cleveland Indians from 2004 to 2005, reached deep into his bag of tricks during an outing against the Hanshin Tigers to pull out one of the most impressive Eephus pitches we’ve ever seen.

The ball left Tadano’s hand and reached the peak of its arc roughly 20 feet above the turf before falling directly into the catcher’s mitt for what appeared to be a perfect strike.

The umpire apparently saw it differently, instead calling it a ball. All the batter -- first baseman Mauro Gomez, a familiar face to Boston Red Sox fans -- could do was shake his head and laugh.

It takes some serious confidence to pull out a pitch like this at any time, but it was especially bold for someone in Tadano’s situation. The right-hander was making his season debut Sunday, and the Eephus came on just his fourth pitch.

Also on Sunday, back in the States, Texas Rangers pitcher Yu Darvish -- who has an arsenal of nasty pitches -- unleashed a jaw-dropper.

Darvish turned in one of his best outings of the season, as he struck out 12 Washington Nationals over eight scoreless innings in helping the Rangers to a 2-0 win. Darvish’s 12 strikeouts matched a season high, and he lowered his ERA to 2.08 in the process.

But of those 12 strikeouts, one stood out above the rest. Washington first baseman Adam LaRoche led off the home half of the fourth inning against Darvish. After getting two strikes on LaRoche, Darvish turned to the element of surprise. Darvish uncorked his own 59-mph eephus curveball that caught the outside corner. LaRoche, clearly surprised by the lob, couldn’t get the bat off his shoulder and took the pitch for strike three.

This isn’t something new for Darvish, though. The Rangers ace dropped a 55-mph curve on Detroit Tigers outfielder Torii Hunter just last week in Darvish’s most recent start before Sunday’s gem.

Darvish’s average velocity on his curveball sits around 68 mph, according to FanGraphs.com.

(H/t to Reddit for the Kazuhito Tadano story.)

MORE FROM NESN

Yu Darvish fools Trevor Ploueffe with filthy 61-mph curveball

Jayson Werth frozen by 57-mph curveball

Torii Hunter’s mind is blown by 55-mph eephus pitch

share

Get more from Major League Baseball Follow your favorites to get information about games, news and more

in this topic

Major League Baseball