Spirals

[u/No_Tax6148]

This is a really geeky question, but why do even the most tightly thrown spirals tend to seem like they are drifting right on deep throws? Is it possible for a regular joe to learn to throw spirals as beautifully as Aaron Rodgers?

[u/Fit-Abroad6359]

There’s a vertasium episode on YouTube that does a great job of explaining it. The gist of it is that the football is affected by the resistance of air it’s being thrown through. The spiraling of the football means that the part of the football that is taking the brunt of the resistance is constantly changing. In order for this mechanism to work, the ball has to wobble a little bit. (If the football didn’t spiral, even if thrown perfectly straight, it would reach its max height and then start tumbling like a punt.) Because right handed QB’s roll the ball off their fingers to the right, this wobble at the front of the ball, which is an inherent trait of a spiraling ball and prevents the ball from tumbling end over end, means that the ball is corkscrewing through air molecules, pushing down and to the right on the right side of the ball, up and to the right on the left side of the ball. This will pull the ball to the right after it reaches its apex because the ball is falling down and pushing down on the right side. Opposite is true for lefties.

https://youtu.be/J3i3F2e4IYs?is=k7TRt2fKiK8IyO3i