A groundball pitcher, sometimes referred to as "wormkillers" for the number of balls that hit the dirt and "kill worms" is a pitcher that relies on getting hitters to hit into ground outs instead of flyballs or strikeouts.
Most groundball pitchers rely heavily pitches with good downward movement (sink), such as the sinker, the two-seam fastball, and the splitter/forkball. These pitches are used to 'jam' hitters, causing them to hit the ball into the ground, and to an infielder. As a result, many groundball pitchers have a very high groundout to flyout ratio (GO-AO), and a high number of double plays turned. Examples include Brandon Webb, Tim Hudson, Derek Lowe, Aaron Cook, Nick Blackburn and Chien-Ming Wang.
Famous quotes containing the word pitcher:
“Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or
the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the
cistern.
Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit
shall return unto God who gave it.
Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher, all is vanity.”
—Bible: Hebrew Ecclesiastes (l. XII, 6–7)