How Mariano Rivera Dominates Hitters

Here is an excellent animation from the New York Times showing how Mariano Rivera has been such a dominant closer in baseball. It shows how his similar deliveries result in drastically different ball placement at the plate. They analyzed nearly 1300 of his pitches over the 2009 season. The scatterplots show the location of the ball as it goes over the plate. He is amazingly adept at keeping the ball on the corners and away from the middle of the plate, where a hitter would have the best contact.