ajgartland22

Definitely good to keep in mind... I always hit the ball long and with way too much force

Sports Authority Field at Mile High doesn't have that name for just any reason. Home to the Denver Broncos, it is exactly one mile above sea level and is surrounded by the thinnest air in the NFL. As far as football goes, thin air really benefits the home team in many more ways than expected. Other than the obvious facts that kicks and passes go farther, daily practice at that elevation can make a football team extremely effective when it comes to the physical side of the game. When the Broncos are away, the thicker, more oxygen-rich air they play in only makes them a better, more effective team that is seemingly better conditioned than their opponents. These conditions work well for football, but not so much for the very different game of baseball. Coors Field, also in Denver is home to the Colorado Rockies, who unlike the Broncos, are not known for their league- dominating defense. In fact, despite larger fences and a deeper outfield, Coors Field is known as a hitter- friendly park, or in other words, a park that makes it easy to hit home runs. Now one may say that occurrence is due to the simple fact that less air means less drag and therefore farther flight, but those people are mistaken. This truth has to do with everything that happens before the batter hits the ball, and even before the stadium itself was constructed. The architects who designed Coors Field were very much aware of the fact that balls would carry farther in the thin air of Denver. To combat this, they pushed the outfield fences back well past the average distances to left, center and right fields. Because of this move, the designers created the largest outfield in the MLB, and with it, the most area for outfielders to cover. This creates many prime landing spots for balls hit by opposing teams. Its also worth mentioning that the longer fences weren't really long enough, and since its first game, Coors Field has had a very strong "hitter- friendly" reputation. Now architecture is all well and good, but some may still ask: what does this all have to do with physics?? The answer lies in what happens to the baseball in this high elevation and large outfield. Before the game is even started, a shipment of official MLB balls are received and stored in a room separate from both teams (and safe from any Boston players with air pumps from their favorite NFL team) until the umpires and stadium officials take balls as needed for the game that day. Sitting untouched at such a high altitude actually dries out the balls and makes them denser than normal (because of the low humidity at high elevation). This denser version of the ball is prime material for hitters, as it is more responsive to the force sustained from the bat and will travel much farther than a more moist ball. Humidity aside, from the second the ball is released from the pitcher's hand, the defense is put at yet another disadvantage. As I've covered before in a previous post, airflow over a baseball and the Magnus Effect dictate the direction and severity of the "break" (curve/ movement) in a baseball. With less actual air in the space around the ball, there will be less interacting with the seams, meaning less overall movement of the pitch and therefore a much easier pitch for a hitter to drive over the fence. Then of course, when the ball is in the air, less air density will offer less resistance to the flight of the ball and through all of these factors, baseballs fly out of Coors at a very high rate. Since the construction of Coors Field, many studies have been done on the effects thin air on baseball and as a result, humidifiers have been added to baseball storage rooms at Coors. This has actually helped reduce the amount of home runs but this thin air, coupled with the so-so skill of most Colorado players (sorry Rockies fans) makes a very unfortunate combo that calls into question the true meaning of "home field advantage".

The beauty of baseball is the fact that any single detail of the game to can be analyzed way more than most people want to know. Everything from the moisture of the grass to how a player catches a ball can play huge roles in a game. Even in something as small as catching a ball, physics can be found in not only the method of catching but in the actual construction of the baseball glove. During a professional baseball game, players routinely throw the ball at speeds approaching 100 mph and can hit the ball even harder than that. Some of the power hitters in the league can produce batted ball speeds of 120 mph. This is an impressive feat in itself not even considering the fact that there are men trying to pluck that ball out of the air and make a play to get that batter out. The glove plays a huge role in allowing the fielders to handle such a force. The pocket of the glove rests between the thumb and index finger and serves as a place for the ball to decelerate in a place that isn't directly over the hand and wont hurt the player. Anybody who has caught an object with their bare hand knows that if traveling fast enough, it can deliver a pretty punishing blow. The leather webbing pocket on a glove gives the ball a larger surface area to distribute its force upon and even expands to give the ball more time/ space to decelerate. Following Newton's second law, if the ball is caught with the pocket of the glove, it is given more time to decelerate and therefore will have a smaller final acceleration. With this smaller acceleration, the glove, and therefore the player, will have to deal with less force with a glove than without one.

I hope you all realized the Raiders are winning the Super Bowl

Hate that feeling when it feels like the centripetal force is going to force you out of the car on tight turns

Life without friction would not be fun but it would be funny to watch people try and do simple tasks that are impossible without friction.

such a fun game! we played all the time until my cousin dove onto the net thinking it would bounce him back up....

Well if my last blog didn't get you interested about baseball hopefully this one will... Introduced to 3 pilot stadiums in 2014 and now in its 2nd full season of league- wide use, STATCAST is yet another way for baseball (and physics) fans to geek out about anything that goes on in between the chalk lines. Essentially, STATCAST uses common methods of tracking and, with the help of computer and human input, creates powerful graphics, videos and analysis in a matter of minutes. This system is a huge step up from the PITCHf/x technology because of the sheer number of variables it can cover. Now not only pitches can be monitored in depth, but the entire field of play, including every player and baserunner, who can be analyzed for what could be eternity. Everything from reaction time, top speed or even vertical jump can be extracted from any play and for any purpose. This amazing tool is made possible by the Doppler effect and the utilization of that property through Doppler radar. The waves sent out by the sensor rebound off of the object in question (such as a player, bat or ball) and through the conclusion that altered wave lengths reveal how fast and in what direction the object is moving, the waves coming back can be analyzed and turned into stats with amazing detail and accuracy. Not only is the Physics really amazing, but the sheer ability and skill of these athletes are now being brought to light. Any fan can now routinely see a player track down a fly ball and notice that he is running almost as fast as a world class runner. Seemingly small stats like these open up a whole new layer to an already complex game and help fans develop an even deeper appreciation for the athletes that play our national pastime. Here is a video of STATCAST being put to great use in a game between the St. Louis Cardinals and the Washington Nationals. Enjoy!

Last week our physics class failed at a single attempt to calculate the horizontal distance traveled by a projectile launched from a projectile launcher. After one test launch, we were required to calculate the delta x of a ball launched at an angle of -4 degrees. I think the biggest factor contributing to our failure was the lack of effective communication and teamwork. When it came time to gather values to calculate the distance, the main form of communication was that of yelling louder than the next person so you could distribute your information. With better communication, the class as a whole would have more time to work through the problem and possibly not feel the intense time crunch that we did when we were conducting the lab. The biggest difference between the first and second shots was the fact that the -4 degree angle meant that the ball had an initial velocity in the downwards direction instead of upwards. Once I got past that and found the y-component of the velocity vector, I was able to find time in the air and then plug that into the second equation to find delta x. Looking back on it, our class definitely had the brainpower to get this right the first time, we just cracked under pressure and gave into the confusion just a little bit. Overall it was still a great lab and a fun challenge for the beginning of the year. .

I think I would have to go with Kershaw on this one but back when Lincecum was in his prime he had a nice curve too!

Baseball. Often dismissed by many because of how "slow" and "boring" it is. This being said, anybody who knows anything about physics should strongly disagree with these statements. The truth is, every 15- 20 seconds, a ball flies towards the batter travelling 80+ mph and curving up to a foot in one direction all the while a batter is trying to hit that ball to distances exceeding 400 feet. The most interesting piece of this intense chain of events is the movement of the ball, which requires years of practice, refinement and sometimes plain luck. The most common type of moving pitch is the curveball. This pitch, depending on the pitcher, can be thrown up to 90 mph and break as much as 16 inches. There are many methods to throwing the curve but the real secret lies in rpms. One of the best pitchers in baseball, Clayton Kershaw, imparts 1628 rpm of spin on his curveball, which makes it one of the best ever seen. Recently, the study of rpm has been a widely discussed topic because of the new developments in MLB's PITCHf/x system. This system, which was phased into all 30 stadiums starting in 2006, uses 2 cameras mounted in the stadium that track location, velocity, launch angle, release point and spin rate. This state of the art system proves the theory that rpms are the key to curveballs. The raised seams on a baseball make it easy to generate pressure differential, and curveballs utilize this advantage by creating an area of high pressure above the ball, forcing it down faster than gravity would normally take it. Higher rpms generate higher pressure and therefore a better pitch that moves more, has more velocity and will fool more batters. Here are some great examples of rpms at work.. .

Really similar to baseball! I know with a baseball rpms are the key to making it move i wonder how much of a role those play with a soccer ball.