View example sentences, synonyms and word forms for Knuckleball.
Knuckleball meaning
A pitch thrown with the ball gripped on the fingertips and released with no rotation, which travels over an unpredictable path to the plate due to micro-turbulence in the air. | A type of delivery where a fast bowler holds the ball on the knuckles of the index and middle fingers. | An event that is hard to predict.
Example sentences (9)
While teams with a knuckleballer on their pitching staff often employ a special "knuckleball catcher" who is equipped with a knuckleball mitt, similar to a first baseman's glove, it is still extremely difficult to catch.
He threw his knuckleball twice in the first inning and then not again until he threw it 11 times between the fourth and fifth innings.
So the knuckleball was his way of trying to tire me out, ’cause I didn’t want to have to catch it — it’d go by me and I’d have to go pick it up.
They’re facing right-hander Matt Waldron, whose pitching arsenal is headlined by a knuckleball.
He bowls a slew of them in an over, and in addition to the (conventional!) knuckle ball that dips and goes straight, he occasionally lowers the arm and gets the knuckleball to go break away like a legbreak.
Ball Four: My Life and Hard Times Throwing the Knuckleball in the Major Leagues.
He hit a Tim Wakefield knuckleball just over the low fence into the Giant's bullpen in right field.
In 2012, R.A. Dickey became the first knuckleball pitcher to win the award. citation In 1974, Mike Marshall won the award, becoming the first relief pitcher to win the award.
The physics that make a knuckleball so difficult to hit make it similarly difficult to catch.