A split-finger fastball or splitter is a pitch in baseball. It is named after the technique of putting the index and middle finger on different sides of the ball, or "splitting" them. When thrown hard, it appears to be a fastball to the batter, but suddenly "drops off the table" towards home plate—that is, it suddenly moves down, towards the batter's knees. It was made famous by closer Bruce Sutter, who would be the first of many pitchers to make it a so-called "bread-and butter" or "lights-out" pitch of his repertoire. Sutter stated that while he was in the Chicago Cubs' farm system, a minor-league pitching instructor named Fred Martin saw Sutter favoring his elbow. As Sutter was recovering from recent arm surgery, Martin encouraged Sutter to try throwing the split-finger pitch, reasoning it would place less duress on his arm. Many give credit to Roger Craig for inventing and perfecting the pitch. The split-finger grip is similar to the forkball grip, but the forkball is pushed further back between the fingers and is usually thrown with a wrist flip that makes it slower than the splitter. The split-finger is often recommended as an alternative to breaking pitches to young players because of its simplicity and the significantly reduced risk of injury.
It is thrown today by many pitchers, including Freddy Garcia, Ryan Dempster, Carl Pavano, Carlos Zambrano, Dan Haren, Rich Harden, Jose Valverde, Jonathan Papelbon, Roy Halladay, and Mike Pelfrey.
David Cone was famous for his splitter, used most often in the middle and later part of his career. A major strikeout pitch for him, Cone would throw it hard like a fastball to get swinging strikes. He also was very effective in throwing it slower, using it as a changeup to throw off hitters' timing. Mike Scott learned the pitch from Roger Craig after the 1984 season and it turned his career around. He won the 1986 NL Cy Young award and posted a league leading 306 strikeouts. Roger Clemens developed a splitter later in his career as well, using it frequently as a strike out pitch. His splitter was made very effective by his very high arm angle, which made it difficult to differentiate from his fastball until it broke.
The motion of a split-finger pitch is similar to the outlawed spitball, and at one time the pitch was known as the "dry spitter". When thrown, the pitcher must emphasize the downward pull of the pitch at the end of his motion. Thrusting the hand and forearm downward is what causes the "drop off the table" movement from the pitch. The split-finger fastball is a very effective pitch with runners on base. A common tactic is using the split-finger to cause the batter to hit into a double play. When thrown correctly, the split-finger's last second drop causes many batters to hit the top half of the baseball therefore inducing a ground ball.
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