Masters
Chances are, if you scroll on Instagram or X for long enough you’ll probably see a clip of a pitcher making a hitter look silly when they swing at a pitch way outside of the strike zone. You may even be sitting on your couch yelling at the TV, wondering why your team’s best hitter is constantly swinging at pitches in the dirt. The answer to this question, simply, is a concept called tunneling. Tunneling is made possible by choosing the right pitch sequence.
Tunneling is when a pitcher uses pitch sequencing to make a pitch look similar to their other pitches long enough for the hitter to be fooled by the pitch.
A pitch Sequence is the order in which pitches are thrown in an at-bat, classified by pitch type.
Tunneling
When a pitcher throws a fastball in the lowest and furthest away from the hitter part of the strike-zone, it utilizes a specific tunnel. The hitter will see that, and remember what the pitch looked like. If the pitch was a strike or fouled off, they might even be looking for the same pitch again. Either way, this allows a pitcher to use that tunnel created by the fastball to their advantage. A common way to use this tunnel would be to throw a slider that starts in that exact same part of the strike-zone and let it break into the dirt. If done correctly, this would probably generate a swing and miss.
Here’s an example of that exact same pitch sequence from Athletic’s closer, Mason Miller.
Another way that a pitcher could utilize tunneling is to ‘use their miss’. Pitchers using their miss is extremely common practice, and very important to having success at the highest level. Say a pitcher misses their fastball outside of the strike-zone towards their arm-side. If that miss isn’t too far outside of the strike-zone, the pitcher would be able to throw a slider or curveball that starts in the same tunnel as the fastball, but lands in the middle of the zone.
Here’s an example of that sequence from Pirates starter, Paul Skenes.
Arsenal
A pitcher’s arsenal is extremely important to pitch tunneling. The term Arsenal in baseball refers to what pitches a certain pitcher throws in a game. There are many ways to determine what sort of arsenal a pitcher should have, but it’s common to see pitchers adopt one of two approaches, horizontal or vertical. A pitcher’s arsenal is largely determined by their mechanics, arm-slot, and whether they are a pronator or supinator.
A horizontal based arsenal would feature any combination of the following pitches: a fastball that runs arm-side, a sinker, a cutter, a changeup with horizontal movement, a slider, a sweeper, and a sweeping curveball.
A vertically based arsenal would feature any combination of the following pitches: a fastball with ride, a cutter, a splitter or changeup that moves vertically, a gyro slider, and a 12-6 curveball.
The reason that these two classifications are made, is because these pitches are the easiest to tunnel with one another. Each one of these pitches look like one another directly out of a pitcher’s hand, making it more difficult for the hitter to differentiate between them.
This is a tunneling masterclass from Paul Skenes against the Dodgers.