Pitcher Pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw a walk. In the numbering system used to record defensive plays, the pitcher is assigned the number 1. The pitcher is often considered the most important player on the defensive side of the game, and as such is situated at the right end of the defensive spectrum. There are many different types of pitchers, such as the starting
Origins of baseball up. In other variants the batter himself tossed the ball into the air with his free hand, as in fungo. A feature of some versions of cat that would later become a feature of baseball was that a batter would be out if he swung and missed three times. Another game that was popular in early America was "one ol' cat", the name of which was possibly originally a contraction of "one hole catapult". In one ol' cat, when a batter is put out, the catcher goes to bat, the pitcher catches, a fielder becomes the pitcher, and other fielders