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Unhittable: How Technology, Mavericks, and Innovators Engineered Baseball's New Era of Pitching Dominance
The baseball expert famously known as PitchingNinja explores the revolution that has given pitchers an unprecedented advantage in today’s game.
Pitching dominates baseball as never before. Spin rate, sweepers, 105 mph fastballs—all have become standard when evaluating pitching arms and techniques and are familiar lingo in discussion and analysis of the game. Gone is the era of the swaggering power hitters. Batting averages are close to the deadball era; team records for strikeouts are broken and then broken again. The game has fundamentally changed, and hitters may never catch up.
Rob Friedman has closely observed this revolution that has transformed baseball for both players and fans. A self-taught coach who has evolved into a sought-after pitching analyst by players, teams, and sports networks, he breaks it all down in this fascinating chronicle.
Friedman spotlights the influential figures behind this transformation. Tom House, a former MLB pitcher turned coaching visionary, utilized cutting-edge technology to refine the techniques of legends like Nolan Ryan and Randy Johnson. His unconventional methods paved the way for a new era shaped by the collision of technology and tradition. Brent Strom, another MLB pitching insider, has used data to revive flagging careers—helping stars like Justin Verlander, Gerrit Cole, and Charlie Morton to use technology to enhance their performance. Friedman also celebrates the rise of external innovators like Kyle Boddy of Driveline Baseball, who has trained elite pitchers such as Trevor Bauer, Shohei Ohtani, and Clayton Kershaw, using advanced analytics and technology, as well as others.
Peppered with insights drawn from interviews with top pitchers, Unhittable is an insider's look at how these advancements have been used by players themselves, and how they have fundamentally changed America’s pastime.
Pitching dominates baseball as never before. Spin rate, sweepers, 105 mph fastballs—all have become standard when evaluating pitching arms and techniques and are familiar lingo in discussion and analysis of the game. Gone is the era of the swaggering power hitters. Batting averages are close to the deadball era; team records for strikeouts are broken and then broken again. The game has fundamentally changed, and hitters may never catch up.
Rob Friedman has closely observed this revolution that has transformed baseball for both players and fans. A self-taught coach who has evolved into a sought-after pitching analyst by players, teams, and sports networks, he breaks it all down in this fascinating chronicle.
Friedman spotlights the influential figures behind this transformation. Tom House, a former MLB pitcher turned coaching visionary, utilized cutting-edge technology to refine the techniques of legends like Nolan Ryan and Randy Johnson. His unconventional methods paved the way for a new era shaped by the collision of technology and tradition. Brent Strom, another MLB pitching insider, has used data to revive flagging careers—helping stars like Justin Verlander, Gerrit Cole, and Charlie Morton to use technology to enhance their performance. Friedman also celebrates the rise of external innovators like Kyle Boddy of Driveline Baseball, who has trained elite pitchers such as Trevor Bauer, Shohei Ohtani, and Clayton Kershaw, using advanced analytics and technology, as well as others.
Peppered with insights drawn from interviews with top pitchers, Unhittable is an insider's look at how these advancements have been used by players themselves, and how they have fundamentally changed America’s pastime.
- GenresSportsBaseballNonfiction
288 pages, Hardcover
Published March 24, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
April 4, 2026
This cannot earn 5 stars because of how he handled Bauer. I hope Friedman reads this and thinks about it.
Bauer's 194 game SA suspension is mentioned once. Never again.
Bauer comes off as an iconoclast and that his pitching career fizzled because of his obstinancy.
Allegations of violence against women are well-document.
His harassment of female journalists on Twitter had real consequences.
His misogyny in interviews is odious.
The reactions to the Dodgers signing him earns nary a mention.
There are almost no women in this book. That isn't a critique per se, but the way that baseball is gendered would have been discussed in a better version of this book.
The name "Pitching Ninja" [I feel uncomfortable even typing it] has never sat right with me. Friedman explains early that it is an homage to his Japanese wife and was used to describe his half-Japanese son. But branding it draws upon orientalist tropes, even benevolent one. A white guy calling his brand pitching ninja is an orientalist cooption. The sword metaphor foments a certain kind of exotic, orientalist masculinity.
Is the book informative? Yes. Is it well-written? Yes. I consider myself fairly knowledgeable about the story he was telling and believe he told it well, despite not getting into the labor issues.
Bauer's 194 game SA suspension is mentioned once. Never again.
Bauer comes off as an iconoclast and that his pitching career fizzled because of his obstinancy.
Allegations of violence against women are well-document.
His harassment of female journalists on Twitter had real consequences.
His misogyny in interviews is odious.
The reactions to the Dodgers signing him earns nary a mention.
There are almost no women in this book. That isn't a critique per se, but the way that baseball is gendered would have been discussed in a better version of this book.
The name "Pitching Ninja" [I feel uncomfortable even typing it] has never sat right with me. Friedman explains early that it is an homage to his Japanese wife and was used to describe his half-Japanese son. But branding it draws upon orientalist tropes, even benevolent one. A white guy calling his brand pitching ninja is an orientalist cooption. The sword metaphor foments a certain kind of exotic, orientalist masculinity.
Is the book informative? Yes. Is it well-written? Yes. I consider myself fairly knowledgeable about the story he was telling and believe he told it well, despite not getting into the labor issues.
Read
April 30, 2026Just reiterated things so many times. Book could’ve been 50 pages shorter.
June 21, 2026
Throughout the history of baseball, there have always been eras in which either pitching or hitting dominated the game. Currently, there is little doubt that this is an era of pitching dominance with pitch speeds higher than ever. There are new advanced statistics and modern technology methods to measure them. This book by Rob Friedman explores the evolution of technology and other ways of making pitchers more dominant than the traditional methods of scouting and gut instincts.
There is a little self-promotion in the book as Freidman is the creator of Pitching Ninja, the platform where Freidman, a pitching coach and baseball analyst, will show videos of various pitches from pitchers from various levels of baseball and these videos are used by pitchers who want to improve their craft. However, as the book explains, video is far from the only explanation why pitching is currently dominating baseball.
Something that will be appreciated by interested readers is that while Friedman does provide a lot of talk about new methods of analyzing data on pitchers, advanced technology to help create that data and other platforms like Codify, Friedman does not delve too far into language that is difficult to understand. He also talks about each of these subjects by using the success of current pitchers like Tarik Skubal, Trevor Bauer and Tyler Glasnow to illustrate how these new methods of training and coaching are improving the quality of pitchers.
It should also be noted that Friedman does include pitchers and coaches from most eras to show not only the advancements made for pitching but also how some had the foreshadowing to incorporate some of today’s coaching and pitching mechanics into their careers, even if not quite as advanced as they are today. Two excellent examples of these forward-thinking baseball men mentioned prominently in the book are Hall of Fame pitcher Greg Maddux and long-time pitching coach Tom House. There are even segments going back as far as the days of Walter Johnson and Christy Matthewson, mainly on how velocity was important to them even those early days before radar guns.
While there are sections that I felt dragged somewhat mainly because of repetition, nevertheless this is a very good book on explaining why this era of baseball is dominated by pitching. It even includes some explanation from a hitter’s point of view, most notably Athletics All-Star Brent Rooker. If a reader wants to know why pitchers are so hard to hit in today’s game, this is a good place to find out.
I wish to thank Harper for providing a copy of the book via NetGalley. The opinions expressed in this book are strictly my own.
https://sportsbookguy.blogspot.com/20...
There is a little self-promotion in the book as Freidman is the creator of Pitching Ninja, the platform where Freidman, a pitching coach and baseball analyst, will show videos of various pitches from pitchers from various levels of baseball and these videos are used by pitchers who want to improve their craft. However, as the book explains, video is far from the only explanation why pitching is currently dominating baseball.
Something that will be appreciated by interested readers is that while Friedman does provide a lot of talk about new methods of analyzing data on pitchers, advanced technology to help create that data and other platforms like Codify, Friedman does not delve too far into language that is difficult to understand. He also talks about each of these subjects by using the success of current pitchers like Tarik Skubal, Trevor Bauer and Tyler Glasnow to illustrate how these new methods of training and coaching are improving the quality of pitchers.
It should also be noted that Friedman does include pitchers and coaches from most eras to show not only the advancements made for pitching but also how some had the foreshadowing to incorporate some of today’s coaching and pitching mechanics into their careers, even if not quite as advanced as they are today. Two excellent examples of these forward-thinking baseball men mentioned prominently in the book are Hall of Fame pitcher Greg Maddux and long-time pitching coach Tom House. There are even segments going back as far as the days of Walter Johnson and Christy Matthewson, mainly on how velocity was important to them even those early days before radar guns.
While there are sections that I felt dragged somewhat mainly because of repetition, nevertheless this is a very good book on explaining why this era of baseball is dominated by pitching. It even includes some explanation from a hitter’s point of view, most notably Athletics All-Star Brent Rooker. If a reader wants to know why pitchers are so hard to hit in today’s game, this is a good place to find out.
I wish to thank Harper for providing a copy of the book via NetGalley. The opinions expressed in this book are strictly my own.
https://sportsbookguy.blogspot.com/20...
April 4, 2026
I have tons of respect for Rob, I have been following the PitchingNinja account for years and will continue to do so. He has done so much for the game of baseball. Unfortunately, the book read awkwardly and felt lost at time, I did not enjoy it. There were some cool anecdotes scattered throughout but overall, it felt disjointed and clunky.
April 14, 2026
I'm a daily watcher of his YouTube channel but I'm not quite into pitching enough to get the most out of this. The 2 full chapters lionizing Trevor Bauer were a real put off as well. Fuck that guy. I dropped a star for that reason alone.
April 28, 2026
Some interesting pieces, but this was all over the place. Chapters at times seemed randomly ordered, concepts explained multiple chapters after they’re first introduced, and times where I think he wrote 3 versions of a paragraph and instead of picking one kept all three.
April 8, 2026
Unhittable is an interesting and exhaustive exploration of the development of modern day pitching in baseball and how technology and outsiders have shaped it.
I enjoyed the detailed aspects of this, going into some of the different pitchers and how they have shaped the changes in the pitching and how they’ve embraced the technology and stats to different degrees. The part of Skenes was particularly interesting.
It’s very detailed oriented book and I can see how that would not appeal to everyone. However if you’re interested in the technology and development of pitching and have a statistics lean this is a good book.
I will say though, talking about Bauer in depth with minimal mention of his SA suspension and overall misogyny with just saying it’s controversy is very disappointing and he shouldn’t have been brought up. It was difficult to listen to those chapters to say the least.
The narration of the book was good and engaging.
I enjoyed the detailed aspects of this, going into some of the different pitchers and how they have shaped the changes in the pitching and how they’ve embraced the technology and stats to different degrees. The part of Skenes was particularly interesting.
It’s very detailed oriented book and I can see how that would not appeal to everyone. However if you’re interested in the technology and development of pitching and have a statistics lean this is a good book.
I will say though, talking about Bauer in depth with minimal mention of his SA suspension and overall misogyny with just saying it’s controversy is very disappointing and he shouldn’t have been brought up. It was difficult to listen to those chapters to say the least.
The narration of the book was good and engaging.
May 16, 2026
Why do you suppose I didn't get much out of this book?
I mean, there is plenty of good info in here. It lives up to its title as you get discussions of everything from Driveline to using modern physics to individualized program to pitch creation to heat maps to weighted balls to Tom House to the impact of social media on pitcher training to ... yeah, plenty of stuff.
Well, in part it's because I'd already read about much of this in "The MVP Machine." That might explain a little of my "meh" of a reaction, but only a little.
Mostly, I thnk this is just a horribly structured book, in that there is hardly any structure. It feels like Friedman grabbed all the notecards of all the points he wanted to make, threw them up in the air, and how they landed is how he organized it. That is slightly unfair, as the opening chapters and closing chapters feel like they belong where they do, but everything else is just this amorphous blob where nothing really seems to stand out. Also, and this may sound like a minor gripe but I think it's a big part of the problem for me, the chapters aren't even given titles. 23 chapters over 245 pages and hardly any chapters have an identity that really sticks out. The only parts that really stand out are the really random ones, like a discussion of 19th century pitcher Candy Cummings that shows up midway through the book for no apparent reason.
One other thing crept up on me as I read this and bugged me: There was a definite level of booster-ism in this. Look, I get it - Friedman is trying to describe the whos/whys of how pitching has advanced and so the people and things he are looking at are rather effective. Therefore you would expect them to come off well. Still, it felt overdone. Everything and everyone has an unstoppable hunger or has a relentness nature or a deep commitment or a advanced willingness to learn or .... Look, I'll give an example. A section on Driveline notes how the company is getting involved more and more in youth sports. This is framed as part of Driveline's overall commitment to baseball. Er - excuse me (raises hand) -- is it OK if I point out a rather obvious profit motive at place?
I'd already noticed this positive spin tendency in the book - then we get two chapters on Trevor Bauer. Based on the previous paragraph, you can imagine how the book handles him.
Look, I get it. This is a book on how pitching has advanced in the last decade and Bauer is absolutely a pivotal figure in the modern pitching revolution. Bauer has to be here, and his impact on the modern game is impressive .... but there are ways of handling Bauer, and a whole lot of them are better than what Friedman does. He just falls into court stenographer role and let's Bauer make his points with minimal (or less) pushback. Bauer's lesson from his own fall? He should've been more aware of his personal branding in the modern media age. (My own take on how Friedman should've handled this: note the Bauer baggage and then just say, "Look, this book is just about pitching" and move on.
So I found myself rooting against the book. The info is good but the book itself is annoying to read.
I mean, there is plenty of good info in here. It lives up to its title as you get discussions of everything from Driveline to using modern physics to individualized program to pitch creation to heat maps to weighted balls to Tom House to the impact of social media on pitcher training to ... yeah, plenty of stuff.
Well, in part it's because I'd already read about much of this in "The MVP Machine." That might explain a little of my "meh" of a reaction, but only a little.
Mostly, I thnk this is just a horribly structured book, in that there is hardly any structure. It feels like Friedman grabbed all the notecards of all the points he wanted to make, threw them up in the air, and how they landed is how he organized it. That is slightly unfair, as the opening chapters and closing chapters feel like they belong where they do, but everything else is just this amorphous blob where nothing really seems to stand out. Also, and this may sound like a minor gripe but I think it's a big part of the problem for me, the chapters aren't even given titles. 23 chapters over 245 pages and hardly any chapters have an identity that really sticks out. The only parts that really stand out are the really random ones, like a discussion of 19th century pitcher Candy Cummings that shows up midway through the book for no apparent reason.
One other thing crept up on me as I read this and bugged me: There was a definite level of booster-ism in this. Look, I get it - Friedman is trying to describe the whos/whys of how pitching has advanced and so the people and things he are looking at are rather effective. Therefore you would expect them to come off well. Still, it felt overdone. Everything and everyone has an unstoppable hunger or has a relentness nature or a deep commitment or a advanced willingness to learn or .... Look, I'll give an example. A section on Driveline notes how the company is getting involved more and more in youth sports. This is framed as part of Driveline's overall commitment to baseball. Er - excuse me (raises hand) -- is it OK if I point out a rather obvious profit motive at place?
I'd already noticed this positive spin tendency in the book - then we get two chapters on Trevor Bauer. Based on the previous paragraph, you can imagine how the book handles him.
Look, I get it. This is a book on how pitching has advanced in the last decade and Bauer is absolutely a pivotal figure in the modern pitching revolution. Bauer has to be here, and his impact on the modern game is impressive .... but there are ways of handling Bauer, and a whole lot of them are better than what Friedman does. He just falls into court stenographer role and let's Bauer make his points with minimal (or less) pushback. Bauer's lesson from his own fall? He should've been more aware of his personal branding in the modern media age. (My own take on how Friedman should've handled this: note the Bauer baggage and then just say, "Look, this book is just about pitching" and move on.
So I found myself rooting against the book. The info is good but the book itself is annoying to read.
April 25, 2026
Any baseball fan plugged into the National Pastime in the current age gets a sense that the pitchers are way ahead of the hitters. Batting average is down, contact is down, and strikeouts are up. In Unhittable, author Rob Friedman (of PitchingNinja fame) provides some great context for why/how this came to be and what exactly pitchers are doing to refine their movements and arsenals so perfectly.
There are basically two trains of thought that run through Unhittable:
First is Friedman's in-depth explanation of the various technological and analytical tools that pitchers currently use to maximize velocity, perfect their delivery, sequence their pitches, and all the while try to keep their golden appendages healthy. Friedman cites programs like Driveline and technology like Edgertronic cameras, Rhapsodo, Trackman, & Trajekt (among many others) that are being used to dig into the fine details of why the ball moves like it does and how to repeat that over and over again. Though perhaps slightly over the head of even a dedicated baseball fan like me from a technical perspective, all these concepts are fascinating. Friedman even goes so far as to delve into physics concepts like seam-shifted wake and pitch tunneling. He makes a compelling case that pitchers in the modern era are as much scientists as artists.
A second thread running through Unhittable is the historical context. Friedman essentially starts by explaining how pitching used to be coached/taught on "feel" and abstract concepts. Building the body or strengthening the arm via weight training was even discouraged. But then hurlers like Tom Seaver and Nolan Ryan (using the then-unorthodox methods of pitching guru Tom House) broke the mold by showing how conditioning & deep analysis could extend both velocities and careers. The advent of full-capture stadium cameras in the 2010s spurred this on even further, with pitchers like Tarik Skubal and Paul Skenes representing a new wave who are actively studying all aspects of their craft in ways previously unimaginable. The really strong writing here is a welcome break from the more technical aspects of the narrative.
Yes, there is a significant chapter devoted almost solely to Trevor Bauer. This will immediately turn some readers off, but I hope it doesn't. For all of Bauer's personality and off-field foibles, his story absolutely deserves (needs, really) to be recounted here. He truly was on the cutting edge of pitching analytics and in some senses paid a price for being first through the gate (a lot of criticism and scorn). Not that anyone is really feeling sorry for Bauer the individual at this point, but I'm glad he wasn't excluded entirely from this story.
Overall, I found Unhittable to be a fascinating explanation of why pitchers continue to dominate batters in Major League Baseball. In one of the only major sports where the defense controls the ball, pitchers have the ability to always be a step ahead of their offensive counterparts--and that is exactly what is happening at the moment.
There are basically two trains of thought that run through Unhittable:
First is Friedman's in-depth explanation of the various technological and analytical tools that pitchers currently use to maximize velocity, perfect their delivery, sequence their pitches, and all the while try to keep their golden appendages healthy. Friedman cites programs like Driveline and technology like Edgertronic cameras, Rhapsodo, Trackman, & Trajekt (among many others) that are being used to dig into the fine details of why the ball moves like it does and how to repeat that over and over again. Though perhaps slightly over the head of even a dedicated baseball fan like me from a technical perspective, all these concepts are fascinating. Friedman even goes so far as to delve into physics concepts like seam-shifted wake and pitch tunneling. He makes a compelling case that pitchers in the modern era are as much scientists as artists.
A second thread running through Unhittable is the historical context. Friedman essentially starts by explaining how pitching used to be coached/taught on "feel" and abstract concepts. Building the body or strengthening the arm via weight training was even discouraged. But then hurlers like Tom Seaver and Nolan Ryan (using the then-unorthodox methods of pitching guru Tom House) broke the mold by showing how conditioning & deep analysis could extend both velocities and careers. The advent of full-capture stadium cameras in the 2010s spurred this on even further, with pitchers like Tarik Skubal and Paul Skenes representing a new wave who are actively studying all aspects of their craft in ways previously unimaginable. The really strong writing here is a welcome break from the more technical aspects of the narrative.
Yes, there is a significant chapter devoted almost solely to Trevor Bauer. This will immediately turn some readers off, but I hope it doesn't. For all of Bauer's personality and off-field foibles, his story absolutely deserves (needs, really) to be recounted here. He truly was on the cutting edge of pitching analytics and in some senses paid a price for being first through the gate (a lot of criticism and scorn). Not that anyone is really feeling sorry for Bauer the individual at this point, but I'm glad he wasn't excluded entirely from this story.
Overall, I found Unhittable to be a fascinating explanation of why pitchers continue to dominate batters in Major League Baseball. In one of the only major sports where the defense controls the ball, pitchers have the ability to always be a step ahead of their offensive counterparts--and that is exactly what is happening at the moment.
June 27, 2026
Every so often I need to read a baseball book. Sometimes it's historical. This one is contemporary and explains just what the hell has been happening to MLB pitching that has driven up strikeouts and driven down batting averages.
After 'Moneyball', baseball not only discovered the power of statistics but the power of technologically sophisticated data capture and analysis. New machinery, new ways of analyzing body movements led to customized coaching for pitchers.
What's interesting is that like sabermetrics, the old guard of baseball resisted the newfangled technologies. But after pitchers independently contacted private firms to record and analyze their pitching, and came back to the teams greatly improved and with new stuff, the teams had to recognize that a new arms race (pun intended) was afoot (also pun intended).
The author was a part of this new analysis with his Pitching Ninja website, but what it also did was give him street cred in MLB so that he got to interview scads of players and coaches. Plus the guys who invented the cool new tools and labs like Driveline Baseball and Tread Athletics.
If I have a criticism, it's that the book is structured by individual tool or technology, rotating among the pioneers who developed the techniques. Although dates are sometimes mentioned, I didn't get a clear sense of chronology on who developed what when, and when the players and teams caught up to all this. So much of it seems to have happened in the past ten years or so, but a stronger chronology (even just as an appendix) would have made the timing clearer.
The author also toots his own horn quite a bit. It may be justifiable, but it's hard for an outsider to judge.
Finally, the book is almost entirely about the advancements in pitching. It's only around page 220 (of 246 pages) that he focuses on what hitters are doing about it. Granted, it's a book about pitching dominance, but you begin to wonder if hitting will ever have a chance again. His blithe comment toward the end that hitting will adjust doesn't feel earned by the scant information he provides about the tools to improve hitting. The overall league statistics have continued to show that pitching is dominating, and that may be a problem for baseball. As one person says, nobody want to see nine innings of two hits and seventeen strikeouts, except for the pitching purists.
But that's what we may be seeing a lot of, if this book is any indication.
After 'Moneyball', baseball not only discovered the power of statistics but the power of technologically sophisticated data capture and analysis. New machinery, new ways of analyzing body movements led to customized coaching for pitchers.
What's interesting is that like sabermetrics, the old guard of baseball resisted the newfangled technologies. But after pitchers independently contacted private firms to record and analyze their pitching, and came back to the teams greatly improved and with new stuff, the teams had to recognize that a new arms race (pun intended) was afoot (also pun intended).
The author was a part of this new analysis with his Pitching Ninja website, but what it also did was give him street cred in MLB so that he got to interview scads of players and coaches. Plus the guys who invented the cool new tools and labs like Driveline Baseball and Tread Athletics.
If I have a criticism, it's that the book is structured by individual tool or technology, rotating among the pioneers who developed the techniques. Although dates are sometimes mentioned, I didn't get a clear sense of chronology on who developed what when, and when the players and teams caught up to all this. So much of it seems to have happened in the past ten years or so, but a stronger chronology (even just as an appendix) would have made the timing clearer.
The author also toots his own horn quite a bit. It may be justifiable, but it's hard for an outsider to judge.
Finally, the book is almost entirely about the advancements in pitching. It's only around page 220 (of 246 pages) that he focuses on what hitters are doing about it. Granted, it's a book about pitching dominance, but you begin to wonder if hitting will ever have a chance again. His blithe comment toward the end that hitting will adjust doesn't feel earned by the scant information he provides about the tools to improve hitting. The overall league statistics have continued to show that pitching is dominating, and that may be a problem for baseball. As one person says, nobody want to see nine innings of two hits and seventeen strikeouts, except for the pitching purists.
But that's what we may be seeing a lot of, if this book is any indication.
June 26, 2026
Many years ago my cousin who was deep in the arms of the Amway octopus mailed me a book to read -- great! I love books! -- but it wasn't a book, it was a cheap paperback novella-sized sales pitch for multi-level marketing, full of unsourced anecdotes, straw-men arguments meant to debunk other careers or forms of commerce, and, finally, brute-force bullying. The book told me I WOULD be involved in MLM in the future, either as a wealthy seller, or a lowly buyer, or an even more lowly assembly-line worker making goods sold via MLM. Um, yeah. No. None of that happened.
But enough about Unhittable.
This is a book-length sales-pitch for a particular brand of home-grown baseball "analytics", outsiders who purport to have cracked the pitching code. The phrases "data-driven" and "evidence-based" and "actionable" appear on almost every page. Friedman (poster boy for Men Who Look Like Richard Marcinko) talks about success stories like Cole Ragans and Amir Garrett and Michael King... but these pitchers are, for different reasons, not true success stories. Two chapters selling the myth of Trevor Bauer offer vague apologies for discussing him but otherwise place him on a pedestal. The chapter about Brent Strom's success with Jeff Luhnow's 2017 Houston Astros is also missing, um, a lot of context (science could tell you how many hardcover copies of "Unhittable" you could fit in the infamous dugout trash can).
It's not all bad. When not aggressively pushing his friends' businesses, Friedman retells interesting stories about pitching greats from earlier eras -- Rube Waddell, Nolan Ryan, and Johnsons Walter and Randy. The final chapter also mentions that all this data-driven science doesn't really measure the poetry of baseball. Reading this book helps to understand baseball's dreary 2020s iteration but it's a far cry from a five-star baseball story.
But enough about Unhittable.
This is a book-length sales-pitch for a particular brand of home-grown baseball "analytics", outsiders who purport to have cracked the pitching code. The phrases "data-driven" and "evidence-based" and "actionable" appear on almost every page. Friedman (poster boy for Men Who Look Like Richard Marcinko) talks about success stories like Cole Ragans and Amir Garrett and Michael King... but these pitchers are, for different reasons, not true success stories. Two chapters selling the myth of Trevor Bauer offer vague apologies for discussing him but otherwise place him on a pedestal. The chapter about Brent Strom's success with Jeff Luhnow's 2017 Houston Astros is also missing, um, a lot of context (science could tell you how many hardcover copies of "Unhittable" you could fit in the infamous dugout trash can).
It's not all bad. When not aggressively pushing his friends' businesses, Friedman retells interesting stories about pitching greats from earlier eras -- Rube Waddell, Nolan Ryan, and Johnsons Walter and Randy. The final chapter also mentions that all this data-driven science doesn't really measure the poetry of baseball. Reading this book helps to understand baseball's dreary 2020s iteration but it's a far cry from a five-star baseball story.
June 2, 2026
Ok, I love baseball...the game, the stories, the history, and especially the stats, the physics, and the strategy. I had high-bar hopes for this book, and it just didn't deliver. It felt like a Young Adult book about baseball pitching. I wanted meat & potatoes and I got spaghetti O's. The interesting look behind the curtains of the rapidly expanding technology was enticing, but never got into much depth. The same with pitching grips, and pitching planning and strategy. I just always felt the book was treading in shallow water. Way too much personal discussion about pitchers "back of the card" stats that wasn't close to analytics, just stats. And for toppers, Trevor Bauers got WAY too much print for my liking. Besides just being a morally deviant jerk, this book treated him like Christy Mathewson. Parts of the book were worth skimming through, but so would a good magazine article.
April 29, 2026
A fascinating look at how technology, analytics, and outside-the-box thinking have reshaped modern pitching, and as someone who’s been watching Pitching Ninja videos for the past 2–3 years, it was really interesting to see that evolution come together in a complete story. Friedman connects the slow-motion overlays, and “nasty pitch” clips we see online to the bigger picture. Such as how tools like spin rate, movement analysis, and advanced training have turned pitching into a data-driven science and helped create this new era of dominance. The book occasionally feels a bit repetitive or deep in the weeds, but it’s still an engaging and insightful read, especially if you follow today’s game closely. Overall, I’d definitely recommend for baseball fans.
April 11, 2026
Great read. Friedman does well in laying out how technology combined with the drive to do better have led to a baseball revolution of pitchers dominating the game. Throughout the book you can start to visualize how the individualized approach to improvement has taken over (thank goodness) and those that have come on board have thrived. It will be interesting to see how far down the ranks these ideas/practices will become prominent. Bottom line, it’s the hitters’ turn to advance in this back and forth.
April 12, 2026
Friedman provides readers with all the needed insights to appreciate how much pitching has evolved throughout the history of baseball. While some parts may seem redundant, there are important takeaways from each section of the book. The embracement of technological breakthroughs in pitching leaves readers with a desire to see how they can harness new insights into their day to day lives. The game of baseball is ever changing and this is just another chapter in the history of the sport.
May 1, 2026
A great breakdown of how pitching has changed over the last decades, which gives credit to many pioneers both on and off the field. Any baseball fan should read this, especially older fans who have trouble making sense of the direction the game has gone in recent years.
The quality of the writing does leave something to be desired, at times it feels more like I'm reading a collection of school essays rather than a book, but it's still worth reading for any avid baseball fan.
The quality of the writing does leave something to be desired, at times it feels more like I'm reading a collection of school essays rather than a book, but it's still worth reading for any avid baseball fan.
May 22, 2026
Closer to 2.5, but rounded up. Friedman knows his stuff, but this felt like a really interesting article stretched into a full book, as the chapters took on a formulaic approach. The topic is interesting, but could be dry in places. I also think I would have liked this more if there was 90% less Trevor Bauer. Bauer, while important to the evolution of pitching, is incredibly problematic and didn't need to be featured so heavily.
June 28, 2026
Lots of really interesting information and data showing why pitchers are dominating the sport right now. The problem is it isn’t organized well and jumps from technique to technique. It highlights many players in small bursts and then spends multiple chapters on Trevor Bauer which felt completely unnecessary. It also feels repetitive within chapters. If you are a fan of baseball and what makes pitching so great in this era, read this book, but be prepared to feel the disjointed writing.
April 14, 2026
Rob shares lot of interesting stories and history. He also has a tricky balance to play between accessible and catering to knowledgeable fans, while also not offering a repeat of Jeff Passan’s The Arm, so there will be some already familiar moments in this book to some. Despite his clear impact on the sport, there was also a little too much Trevor Bauer for me.
May 9, 2026
So interesting that he goes rounds and rounds about elite pitchers and their stuff, but doesn’t remotely dive into the dangers of pitching to the body. We are still seeing an epidemic of injuries to these kids’ arms, but he barely touches the topic. I also didn’t understand the placement of Trevor Bauer on a pedestal.
May 6, 2026
This is the most comprehensive book I’ve read on the evolution of pitching development.
At the same time- writing style is one-dimensional.
It reads more like a 250-page informational article than a story with a narrative.
At the same time- writing style is one-dimensional.
It reads more like a 250-page informational article than a story with a narrative.
March 30, 2026
Very interesting book on an evolving subject. Loved the discussion of the new technology. A bit repetitive at times.
June 21, 2026
Fun book but repeats itself a bunch and doesn’t really introduce anything groundbreaking that someone following baseball doesn’t know already. Few interesting anecdotes in there at least
July 6, 2026
★★★★★
PITCHING NINJa!
*insert blade cut and joystick controller blood graphics*
Well done Sir; love the program, love the book. Fans of ball will love this read; plan to follow his great show if you enjoy ball, never mind a quality read around what has become the quickest and possibly biggest change in the game.
PITCHING NINJa!
*insert blade cut and joystick controller blood graphics*
Well done Sir; love the program, love the book. Fans of ball will love this read; plan to follow his great show if you enjoy ball, never mind a quality read around what has become the quickest and possibly biggest change in the game.
May 14, 2026
i don't typically rate books i've consumed in audio form but there is entirely too much trevor bauer apologia going on in this one. spending chapters trying to make him a martyr to pitching analytics/biomechanics when he was just a sour guy that didn't know how to treat coaches, women, or teammates and was exiled from organized baseball because of it.
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