Hot and Bothered Professional pitchers have awfully good aim, so when they hit batters with the baseball, it’s safe to assume that it wasn’t an accident. This graph shows data from nearly 60,000 major league baseball games. As you can see, as the temperature on the field increases, so does the likelihood that Team A batters will be hit by Team B pitchers. This effect becomes even stronger when Team B batters have previously been hit by Team A pitchers, suggesting that the Team B pitcher is seeking revenge (Larrick et al., 2011).
ROBERT SABO/NY DAILYNEWS ARCHIVEVIA GETTY IMAGES.
LARICK, R. P., TIMERMAN, T. A., CARTON, A. M., & ABREVAYA, J., PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE, 22(4), PP. 423–428, COPYRIGHT © 2011 BY SAGE PUBLICATIONS. REPRINTED BY PERMISSION OF SAGE PUBLICATIONS.
LARICK, R. P., TIMERMAN, T. A., CARTON, A. M., & ABREVAYA, J., PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE, 22(4), PP. 423–428, COPYRIGHT © 2011 BY SAGE PUBLICATIONS. REPRINTED BY PERMISSION OF SAGE PUBLICATIONS.