Shunsuke Watanabe - Pitching Style

Pitching Style

Watanabe is known for having the world's lowest release point, letting go of the ball only about 2 inches above the ground, and his hand sometimes brushes against the ground as he throws. His body is much closer to the ground than other submarine pitchers, and his right knee has bled during games because it skids against the mound. He puts a pad on the inside of his uniform around the knee to prevent himself from bleeding. Watanabe's form is truly one of a kind, as there is no other pitcher in the world who throws from the same arm angle. Batters have trouble timing their swings against Watanabe, because his pitches seem to come in at completely different speeds compared to those of conventional pitchers.

Watanabe relies on his distinct pitching form and timing to get batters out. In addition to changing speeds with his pitches, he sometimes changes the time he takes to windup and release the ball. He does not have precise control, but is consistent in the lower part of the strike zone. Watanabe is not known to strike out batters, (only 101 strikeouts in 187 innings in 2005) and relies on forcing batters to hit themselves into outs. His underhanded form requires less energy than a conventional pitching form, and he is able to pitch into later innings.

Watanabe throws four main pitches; a rising fastball, slow curve, sinker and slider. Being a submarine pitcher, Watanabe's fastball is slow, sitting in mid to high-70s mph and topping out at low-80s range, with movements. The sinker is probably his best pitch, as he fools batters by throwing it at the same speed as his fastball, or sometimes even faster. His slider is about 8-9 mph slower than his fastball, and breaks downward. Watanabe's curve is very slow, clocking around 60 mph, somewhat similar to the curveball of Washington Nationals pitcher Liván Hernández (which actually is more like an eephus pitch). He often experiments with the curve, changing grips to make it resemble a changeup more than a curve.