Baseball is a century and a half old. During that time, there have been thousands of minute variations in the contest between pitchers and hitters, but after so much time and so much practice, there is now very little room for innovation.

Until recently, the newest pitch to arrive in baseball arrived in the late 50s and didn't become widespread until a modified variation appeared in the 1970s. That pitch is the split-fingered fastball and, for those who care about such things, is credited to Pittsburgh Pirates relief pitcher Elroy Face who dubbed it a "forkball."

And that pitch was it for innovation until 2001, when the essay "The Secret of the Demon Miracle Pitch" was translated from Japanese to English and a new sensation was born.

The Demon Pitch in question is now known as the "gyroball." According to various reports, the gyroball breaks wide, dives deep and generally plays all sorts of havoc with batter's expectations. It looks a bit like a hanging curveball, except it drops too fast towards the plate.

And if descriptions of its motion are strange, its origins are even stranger. The gyroball was first identified by Japanese computer scientist Gitau Kimani in 1995 who was then attempting to model the motion of a child's toy. It was later developed by pitching coach Kazushi Tezuka as a way to both less impact on pitcher's arms and to confuse batters.

Ballplayers use both the speed of a pitcher's throwing motion and the seams of the baseball to time their swings. The difficulty with a gyroball is that it is thrown like a fastball, but with a different actual speed.

Even more difficult to follow is the spin. Gyroballs get their name from gyroscope-which was essentially the toy Kimani was looking at when he discovered the pitch. Most baseballs spin head over heals, but a gyroball spins side-over-side, much in the same way a football is thrown. And this last bit of motion is what hides the seams from the batter.

So no way to judge speed and no way to judge spin and suddenly innovation has again arrived. Or maybe.

There does remain the question of whether anyone actually throws this pitch. While Boston Red Sox Daisuke Matsuzaka is the only player credited with the ability to do so consistently, computer analysis of Matsuzaka's 2007 season by Dan Fox of Baseball Prospectus suggests this may be more myth than fact.

Still, this is the first time in the history of sport a scientist working on a computer has created a pitch that threatens on the field. And since baseball is a uniquely psychological game, perhaps that threat is enough. After all, the Red Sox are paying Matsuzaka $52 million over the next six years-one supposes that at least part of that contract is gyroball cash.