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View Full Version : Japan builds baseball playing robots

Binman4OSU
07-24-2009, 02:32 PM
I was reading an article today that sounded interesting

a company in japan has developed two robots that play baseball.

1 is a pitcher and can currently throw a foam baseball at 25mph and has 3 fingers.

The cool part is that it throws strikes 90% of the time. They are planning on increasing its ability and within several months plan to have a pitching robot that can throw a fastball at 93 mph with the same accuracy. It can also throw a curveball and a slider.

They have to increase the pitching ability, becasue the current batting robot can hit over 99% of the 25mph pitches in the strike zone and won't swing at the ones that are out of the strike zone. They are working on the hitting robot to enable it to directional hit pitches based off the pitches location.


Robot baseball league anyone?
Dez4Prez2012
07-24-2009, 02:54 PM
I don't know about you, but I for one welcome our new robot overlords and offer my services in anyway to help smooth the transition to their wonderful leadership.
OSUCherokee
07-24-2009, 03:11 PM
They already have a robot hitting in the MLB. His name is Ichiro. :cool:
Dez4Prez2012
07-24-2009, 03:13 PM
He's not a machine, he's just Ichiro.
CowpokeMike
07-24-2009, 03:16 PM
why didn't you eliminate them Ichiro?
Roman Craig
07-24-2009, 03:16 PM
The first question that pops in the ole noggin is: Why?
OSUfreak82
07-24-2009, 03:34 PM
They already have a robot hitting in the MLB. His name is Ichiro. :cool:

Damn, I know im pretty late. But when I saw this thread, that is exactly what I thought!
OSUfreak82
07-24-2009, 03:35 PM
I was reading an article today that sounded interesting

a company in japan has developed two robots that play baseball.

1 is a pitcher and can currently throw a foam baseball at 25mph and has 3 fingers.

The cool part is that it throws strikes 90% of the time. They are planning on increasing its ability and within several months plan to have a pitching robot that can throw a fastball at 93 mph with the same accuracy. It can also throw a curveball and a slider.

They have to increase the pitching ability, becasue the current batting robot can hit over 99% of the 25mph pitches in the strike zone and won't swing at the ones that are out of the strike zone. They are working on the hitting robot to enable it to directional hit pitches based off the pitches location.


Robot baseball league anyone?

Will it be on Yahoo or Espn?? Ill join! :D
Dez4Prez2012
07-24-2009, 03:40 PM
Wasn't there a really old baseball video game, talking about maybe NES days, where it was robots?
Binman4OSU
07-24-2009, 03:53 PM
Wasn't there a really old baseball video game, talking about maybe NES days, where it was robots?

HOLY CRAP YES!!! I forgot about that....I think it was called "Base Wars?"

I remember the pitcher had a cannon for an arm and pitched at 140mph or so....and they had metal bats etc
OSUCherokee
07-24-2009, 03:57 PM
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9a/Base_Wars_cover.jpg
http://delllounge.com/resized-image.ashx/__size/550x0/__key/CommunityServer.Blogs.Components.WeblogFiles/charactertraits/basewars.jpg
Dez4Prez2012
07-24-2009, 03:57 PM
It was Base Wars!!!

The robots got into fights over close calls on base.

I thought that game was awesome.

Wasn't the premise that people were sick of professional athletes and their high salaries so they were replaced by robots?

Just sayin...
Binman4OSU
07-24-2009, 03:59 PM
NICE find on the pics! That game ROCKED!

I just noticed that home plate looked alot like the Star Trek communicators they wore on their shirts! haha
therico
07-26-2009, 04:21 PM
I think they will be used in batting cages and things like that. I think they also made them just to say they did. They also made robots that can cook.

About baseball in Japan. When you are a child you pretty much just pick one extra activity you want to play for the rest of your life. These kids start playing baseball at a very early age and they do it year round. It's amazing to me that the Japanese team doesn't always win the LLWS. I live near a school and one time I was running by and saw they were practicing. Talk about an intense practice and these kids couldn't have been much older than 10. When I was watching, I seriously thought I was watching little baseball robots for how fundamentally sound they were.