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Watch In Amazement As This Softball Pitcher Literally Knocks A Man Over With Her Power

Photo: Torrey Purvey/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images.
The next time someone tells you that you "throw like a girl," you can thank them for giving you the highest compliment. Because "throwing like a girl" means emulating University of Oklahoma pitcher Paige Parker, and I'm totally here for it.
How hard does Parker throw, you ask? Well, hard enough that she literally knocked a professional baseball catcher off his feet with her pitch. Talk about throwing heat.
Parker recently threw out the ceremonial first pitch before a Kansas City Royals game at Kauffman Stadium. Before that, she got to hang out in the batting cages with some Royals players for a little game of catch. But Royals backup catcher Drew Butera was unprepared for what was coming his way.
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Parker is a lifelong a Royals fan, having grown up in Independence, Missouri, just 15 minutes from the Royals’ stadium, and says getting to throw the first pitch at one of their games was "a childhood dream." Not only that, when she met some of the players, she found out that they had seen her play. Apparently the guys had been watching some of the Women's College World Series games, including one epic game that went 17 innings. She was stoked to meet some of the players, who we assume were equally jazzed to meet her.
“Some of their reactions were really cool, so that's something I won't ever forget,” Parker told Sooner Sports. “They were pretty shocked about how much my ball moved. I think they were especially fascinated by my rise ball because they never see that." A rise ball is a softball pitch that appears to rise as it approaches the batter, due to combination of backspin, arm angle, and leg lift upon release by the pitcher.
"Drew [Butera] had a hard time catching some of my rise balls, which was pretty funny," Parker added. Butera called the rise ball "no joke."
Needless to say, the internet is pretty impressed.
Then again, girls who play ball don't need a video like this prove just how good they are — they already know. But the validation is always nice, too.
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