Pitchers throwing sidearm/underhanded

[GeoPoto]

I'll open the pre-war door with Walter and then include a guy from my days as a Senators fan:

Dave Baldwin didn’t talk to the baseball or scream at the hitters. Offering no self-styled Mark Fidrych or Al Hrabosky theatrics on the mound, the relief pitcher was a quiet guy to the point of being shy, almost unnoticeable.

Yet in 176 games over six seasons with the Washington Senators, Milwaukee Brewers and Chicago White Sox, Baldwin fashioned a big-league career distinguishable for its unusual approach. As he informed a quizzical President Richard Nixon one night in the dugout, “I’m the pitcher who throws funny.”

Pushing off the rubber, the Arizona native resembled the USS Baldwin — he was a submarine pitcher. He delivered it side-arm, too. For certain, the right hander was someone who went against the conservative MLB grain of the 1960s and ‘70s, when the drop-down pitching style was ridiculed or roundly discouraged.

“I had managers tell me, ‘You throw like a girl,’ ” he said.

Baldwin would slowly swivel his body so that he faced left field in mid-windup, often aim the ball well behind a right-handed hitter’s back to the point it seemed unnatural, and, picking up momentum, he would dip into a crouch and snap off an assortment of sweeping and baffling pitches.

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