In baseball

Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...

, a brushback pitch

Pitch (baseball)

In baseball, a pitch is the act of throwing a baseball toward home plate to start a play. The term comes from the Knickerbocker Rules. Originally, the ball had to be literally "pitched" underhand, as with pitching horseshoes. Overhand throwing was not allowed until 1884.The biomechanics of...

 is a pitch thrown high and inside, usually a fastball, to force the batter away from the plate, often to intimidate. It differs from the beanball

Beanball

"Beanball" is a colloquialism used in baseball, for a ball thrown at an opposing player with the intention of striking him such as to cause harm, often connoting a throw at the player's head...

 in that the intent is not to hit the batter, or intentionally throw at the batter's head. Play-by-play announcers will sometimes call a high brushback pitch as being "high and tight." It is also referred to as chin music.

Hitters will often crowd the plate in order to have a better swing at pitches on the outside half of the plate. The hitters hope that the pitcher will be scared to throw inside because they might hit the batter. The brushback helps a pitcher

Pitcher

In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throwsthe baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw a walk. In the numbering system used to record defensive plays, the...

to "reclaim" the corners of the strike zone by forcing the batter to stand farther away.

While controversial, the brushback can be used an effective part of pitching, although the home plate umpire can issue a warning to, and even eject, a pitcher the umpire feels is trying to hit a batter intentionally.