Swordsman slices 100mph baseball in two

[Carbonman]

@Michael_Lavin

First: This is wonderful and the man is highly skilled.
But: Isn’t the skill comparable to what a batter does when he hits the ball with a bat? The sword is narrower and he does it in one swing, no strikes, but the timing and reaction time is similar to a baseball player at the plate. Especially considering that the pitching machine is dialed in and consistent, not throwing sliders or fastballs.
Again, not to say this is an easy accomplishment just anyone could do. I would probably miss hitting the ball with a bat, a tennis racket or even a snow shovel.

What makes this feat exceptional is the combination of the necessarily very smooth drawing of the katana’s razor sharp ‘live’ blade (shinken) from the thin wood scabbard (saya) in time and with enough accuracy to slice the ball in half. If you screw up any part of the movement, you could end up very badly cut by the blade piercing or splitting the saya.
Notice both hands in motion; the left draws the saya back to faster clear the blade while the right extends the handle (tsuka) straight forward. The saya and katana are rotated simultaneously so the end of the blade can clear the mouth of the saya and orient the cutting edge for the swing to split the ball.

[noahdjango]

wonder no more.
although these are hardly fastballs.

[cjankelson]

@wait_really

IDK if this what they were getting at but the machines can’t pitch fastballs like humans, because they aren’t capable of simulating the types of spin on the ball that a pitcher can

That may be correct for old-fashioned trebuchet-style pitching machines, but modern ones spit the ball out between two rapidly spinning discs. adjust the relative speed of the two discs to get any spin you want; plus the entire assembly can be rotated to set the plane of the discs to any angle you want.

[wait_really]

@cjankelson

That may be correct for old-fashioned trebuchet-style pitching machines, but modern ones spit the ball out between two rapidly spinning discs. adjust the relative speed of the two discs to get any spin you want; plus the entire assembly can be rotated to set the plane of the discs to any angle you want.

@wait_really

There are machines that can be offset to put spin on the pitches, but nothing like what you see from major leaguers or even high school kids.

It simply isn’t the same. You would have to build a machine with many more contact points on the ball to simulate the the forces applied to the ball by a human pitcher. I’m sure it’s possible, but to my knowledge not a thing at this time.

[gfish]

But he was only 9.22 meters away, pretty much exactly half as far as a home base is from the pitcher’s mound

[jab]

I’d argue it’s easier what he does. The batter has to swing the bat and he just seemed to stick it out. Now keep in mind I couldn’t do either. But I think a mlb player hitting a live 100mph pitch with movement is harder.

[wait_really]

@jab

But I think a mlb player hitting a live 100mph pitch with movement is harder.

And that’s if you know it’s coming, which you don’t- you can only guess.

[hecep]

Take THAT, Mr. Split finger fastball.

[hecep]

I thoroughly enjoyed that “Whoooooaaaaa” at 0:27…

… and especially when heard at 1/4 speed playback.