South Portland’s Noah Lewis had a tough sophomore season on the mound for the University of Maine’s baseball team a year ago.
He had a lofty 8.62 earned-run average and opponents were hitting a whopping .310 against him.
“I was failing so hard last year. I didn’t know if I could go out there and even get an out,” Lewis admitted.
Something had to change if the righthander was going to be a contributor this season.
It did, in the form of a new pitch: a splitter.
The results have been dramatic. Lewis was chosen to the All-America East second team this season after going 7-1 with a 4.41 ERA. Opponents are hitting just .200 against him as he and his America East regular season and tournament champion Black Bear teammates prepare to take on the University of Miami in the Coral Gables Regional in the NCAA Division I Tournament in Florida on Friday night.
A splitter is an off-speed pitch that appears to be a fastball, only to sink dramatically at the last second.
“It creates a lot of swings and misses,” Lewis explained. “I can strike more guys out. The fewer balls they put in play, that means more outs and fewer runs.”
The splitter involves a pitcher spreading his pointer finger and middle finger out around the baseball with the U-shaped part of the seam facing home plate. The thumb is at the bottom of the ball.
The pointer finger and middle finger should split the seam of the baseball and be on top of the seam on the outside of the ball.
“I’ve got big hands. It came easy. It only took me a few weeks [to learn it],” said Lewis, who picked it up while pitching for the Keene Swamp Bats of the New England Collegiate Baseball League last summer. He wound up going 3-2 with a 3.92 ERA.
It has given him a ton of confidence.
“I feel so free when I go out there now. I know I can go out and dominate. It feels really nice,” Lewis said. “My stuff wasn’t very good last year. I just had a fastball and a cut fastball, which is essentially two fastballs. I was praying guys would get themselves out instead of me going after them.”
He said he isn’t afraid to fail any more so he just goes out and competes.
“That’s all I can do,” said Lewis, who was 4-6 with a 5.16 ERA as a freshman.
The 6-foot-2, 222-pound Lewis has appeared in 14 games including 13 starts and has allowed only 59 hits in 79 ⅔ innings. He has struck out 73, walked 40 and hit nine batters.
He had eight quality starts among his 13. A quality start consists of pitching at least six innings and allowing three earned runs or less.
“He has been huge. He is an unsung hero,” said UMaine head coach Nick Derba. “He is throwing more strikes this year and he has a pitch that gets swings and misses.”
Lewis loves the fact he is from Maine and the Black Bears are going to their first regional since 2011.
“It’s amazing. I take a lot of pride being from Maine and playing for this university. It feels really good, seeing how happy coach Heath was, too, since he’s from Westbrook,” said Lewis, referring to UMaine assistant coach Scott Heath.
