Curveball - History

History

Baseball lore has it that the curveball was invented in the early 1870s by Fred Goldsmith or Candy Cummings (it is debatable). An early demonstration of the "skewball" or curveball occurred at the Capitoline Grounds in Brooklyn in August, 1870 by Fred Goldsmith. In 1869, a reporter for the New York Clipper described Phonney Martin as an "extremely hard pitcher to hit for the ball never comes in a straight line‚ but in a tantalizing curve." If the observation is true, this would pre-date Cummings and Goldsmith. In 1884, St. Nicholas, a children's magazine, featured a story entitled, "How Science Won the Game". It told of how a boy pitcher mastered the curveball to defeat the opposing batters. In the early years of the sport, use of the curveball was thought to be dishonest and was outlawed, but officials could not do much to stop pitchers from using it. In the past, major league pitchers Bob Feller, Virgil Trucks, Herb Score, Camilo Pascual and Sandy Koufax were regarded as having outstanding curveballs. Other notable curveball pitchers since 1900 are/were Barry Zito, Adam Wainwright, Sal Maglie, Dwight Gooden, Nolan Ryan, David Wells, Darryl Kile, Matt Morris, Orel Hershiser, Aaron Sele, Tommy Bridges, Bert Blyleven, Steve Carlton, and Mordecai "Three Finger" Brown.