Patent ID: 8876638

Claim:
A method for classifying a pitch thrown by a human pitcher, the method comprising: receiving, at a computing device, one or more pitch properties corresponding to a ball physically thrown by the human pitcher, wherein the ball physically thrown by the human pitcher comprises the pitch, and wherein the one or more pitch properties comprise one or more of a breaking distance of the ball, a release speed of the ball, a maximum speed of the ball, a minimum speed of the ball, an average speed of the ball, and a direction of movement of the ball, determined using one or more devices monitoring the ball in flight during the pitch; receiving, at the computing device, pitcher information corresponding to the human pitcher stored in a memory device, wherein the pitcher information includes at least an identification of a plurality of different pitch types that have previously been determined to be in a repertoire of the human pitcher; and classifying, by the computing device and based at least in part on the one or more pitch properties and the pitcher information, the pitch using a pitch classification algorithm stored in the memory device, the pitch being classified as one of the plurality of different pitch types in the repertoire of the human pitcher having the highest likelihood of matching a trajectory of the pitch.