Assuming I am not starting from a false premise, have always wondered why in between innings pitches didn’t count against pitch count, since they seem to be at or near the same velocity as regular pitches. Then I assumed they don’t count them since everyone throws them, so they count perhaps indirectly- a starter with a pitch count of 100 really has one of 100 plus 6 or whatever it is per inning.
So…if a pitcher pissed off at his 100 pitch limit found he could be just as effective without any pitches between innings, could he then legitimately argue his pitch count should be 140 or whatever?
Probably. That said, you couldn’t get it to 140. There’s no way you could shave that many pitches off your in-between-innings warmups. You might be able to shave off 12-16 or so.
They’re probably not stressing their arms by throwing their hardest fastballs or sharpest breaking pitches to create outs during the in between inning pitches. I’ve always just understood them to simply be warm-ups, similar to stretching before exercising. Not throwing them would probably cause more damage (to the arm, shoulder, or scoreboard) over the course of the game.
We just passed the 45th anniversary of the game where Louis Tiant threw about 165 pitches and lost. His opposing pitcher, Nolan Ryan pitched 235! Exact pitch counts aren’t certain as it wasn’t an official stat back then.