Prep Baseball Report

Island Fall ID: Pitching Data Dive


Cam Black-Araujo
Assistant Director, Canada

On Sunday, October 13th, the Prep Baseball British Columbia staff hosted it's second and final Fall ID with the Island Fall ID at the Island Training Centre in Langford, British Columbia. This event featured roughly 10 prospects from the Island in the 2025 - 2028 classes and allowed our staff an opportunity to get an in-depth look at the players, as well as collect updated metrics via our tech partner TrackMan. Fall ID's allow players one final chance to update their metrics and profile before the winter season.

Earlier this week we began our post-event coverage within our Statistical Analysis article. Today we'll take a deeper dive into all of the data we collected from the event within this article as we provide leaderboards on each metric collected on TrackMan during bullpens at the event.

For complete event results, click here.
To view upcoming event schedule, click here.

FASTBALL

MAX VELOCITY (MPH)

Max Fastball Velocity: This metric calculates the speed of the pitch as it’s released from the pitcher’s hand.

SPIN RATE (AVG)

Spin Rate: This metric calculates the rate of spin on the baseball as it leaves the pitcher’s hand, measured in revolutions per minute (rpm). Historical data shows that high-spin fastballs lessen the impact of gravity, allowing for more ‘rise’ (or less fall, in other words) as it carries through the zone. Low-spin fastballs typically indicate the pitch has greater horizontal action, often making it tougher to square up, but generally easier to make contact with, leading to more ground balls, while high-spin fastballs show a correlation with swings and misses.

INDUCED VERTICAL BREAK (AVG.)

Induced Vertical Break: Used in short form as "IVB," this metric is most important on fastballs for creating rise and on curveballs for creating depth – it can also have some use when measuring sliders and cutters as well. Sliders tend to be closer to zero inches while cutters are generally between 5 and 15 inches. Usually fastballs and curveballs with large IVB have higher spin efficiencies as well. Sliders generally have very little (closer to zero) IVB and very low spin efficiency. You could also categorize IVB into spin rate as this is part of the “useful movement” you’re looking for. IVB is also a huge part of the vertical approach angle.

HORIZONTAL MOVEMENT (AVG.)

Horizontal Break: Outlined on TrackMan’s own website: “... horizontal movement is measured in inches between where the pitch actually crosses the front of home plate side-wise, and where it would have crossed home plate side-wise if had it traveled in a perfectly straight line from release. A positive number means the break was to the right from the pitcher’s perspective, while a negative number means the break was to the left from the pitcher’s perspective.”

STRIKE ZONE RATE%

CURVEBALL

SPIN RATE (AVG.)

INDUCED VERTICAL BREAK (AVG.)

HORIZONTAL MOVEMENT (AVG.)

SLIDER

SPIN RATE (AVG.)

INDUCED VERTICAL BREAK (AVG.)

HORIZONTAL MOVEMENT (AVG.)

STRIKE ZONE %

CHANGEUP

HORIZONTAL MOVEMENT (AVG.)

Upcoming Events

Showcase State Date Location
2024 Victoria Eagles/Victoria Mariners Scout Day BC 10/26 Island Training Centre
2024 Whalley Chiefs Scout Day BC 11/03 Sehome High School
2024 Holiday Hitters Series - Victoria BC 12/20 The Edwards Family Training Center
2024 Holiday Hitters Series - North Vancouver BC 12/21 Inside Performance

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