Did you bring a referral for an orthopedic specialist? Or should we just rush your bat to the emergency room?

"You know it's coming hard," says Blue Jays pitcher Dan Plesac. "But you have no idea if it's moving straight -- or eating up your thumbs."

"It runs in on left-handed hitters," says the Twins' Denny Hocking. "And if you swing at it, there is a chance you will lose a finger."

Rivera's cutter comes at you at 95 mph, as fast as a four-seam fastball. And once in a while, that pitch heading your way turns out to be a four-seam fastball. But it's probably going to explode into destructive cutter mode -- boring in on the hands of left-handed hitters, scaring the equilibrium out of right-handed hitters.

"He's got great accuracy with it, and it's 95 miles an hour -- with cut action," says Phillies catcher Mike Lieberthal. "So you've almost got to say to yourself, 'OK, if it starts at my hip, if it looks like it's going to hit me in the hip, I should swing.'"

Ah, but that's the secret. The brain can tell the body what it should do. But the body says, "Be serious." And by that time, you're out.

Right. Tell it to the guys who have to hit it.

"You know it's coming," says one NL GM, "and it doesn't matter."

Precisely. If you could write a definition for a devastating pitch, that's it: Here it is ... We'll be back in a moment with the postgame show.

Hoffman's arm action on his change is totally indistinguishable from his delivery on his fastball. Except when you go to swing, you can't find the baseball.

"I think it physically stops on its way to the plate," says one NL hitter who pleads for anonymity.

"When he throws it correctly," laughs one NL executive, "the hitters couldn't hit it if they got three swings on the same pitch."

The Final Four

	“	It's Mr. Snappy. One of the few disappearing pitches in baseball. His arm angle and velocity force you to commit to this pitch long before it's on you. And when it is on you, it's usually between your feet -- and you've still swung. ”
		— Curt Schilling on Randy Johnson's slider

How do you hit either of these pitches alone, let alone in combination with one another?

Start with the slider, thrown by a man who looks taller than the foul pole, delivered from somewhere around the first-base dugout, finished by a stride so long that Johnson appears to be 20 feet from the plate when he follows through.

"That slider," says Gary Hughes, the Reds' director of pro scouting, "from that body and that arm slot should be declared illegal."

With hitters geared for a smokeball that is a threat to hit 100 on the gun, they see that slider flying up there at speeds higher than many pitchers' fastballs. Then ... it happens:

Spin, gravity and the big man on the other end combine to make you look like an idiot, when the ball winds up two inches above the ground.

"It's Mr. Snappy," says Johnson's stablemate, Curt Schilling. "One of the few disappearing pitches in baseball. His arm angle and velocity force you to commit to this pitch long before it's on you. And when it is on you, it's usually between your feet -- and you've still swung."

Another Unit teammate, Luis Gonzalez, says: "I've seen some of the worst hacks -- by good hitters -- I've ever seen against that pitch."

It's a pitch that doesn't discriminate, because it inspires left-handed hitters to take a night off and inflicts genuine pain on right-handed hitters.

"Find a left-handed hitter who would like to see it," says one NL GM. "And find a right-handed hitter who likes it when it's hammered foul off a shoetop."

But we have to remember what sets it up -- probably the hardest fastball thrown by any left-handed starter in the sport, certainly from inning one through nine.

"Filthy," says one NL front-office man of that Johnson fastball. "Nasty. Heavy. Dominating And it's still all of that late into the game. It almost makes his slider look hittable (which it isn't, of course)."

Lieberthal compares it to Randy Johnson's slider, only from the right side. Astros catcher Brad Ausmus shakes his head at the 91- to 93-mph steam Nen puts on this breaking ball. Scouts rave about its "late tilt."

Nobody sums it up better, though, than Nen's former teammate in Florida, Mets pitcher Al Leiter.

"Robb Nen's slider is unhittable," Leiter says. "Announcers think he throws a forkball. The way the ball comes out of Robbie's hand with such downward plane and drop, the pitch is mistaken for a forkball. I wish I had one of those."

The Elite Eight

"You can make a case for three pitches with Pedro being 'devastating,'" says Hughes. "He's in another world when it comes to pure stuff."

The change: The moment you realize it's a changeup, you've already swung and missed," says Schilling. "He's able to mirror his fastball mechanics so well that you can't pick it up."

The fastball: "It has that elusive movement where you swing and miss, walk back to the dugout and ask another player, 'Did that ball rise?'" says Hocking. "And they say, 'Yes.'"

The curve: "That hard curveball, down and in, just overmatches left-handed hitters," says one scout.

The fastball: "What makes him a complete power pitcher," says Plesac, "is the command of his fastball, to all four quadrants of the plate, like no power pitcher in years. He's Picasso with a machine gun."

The split: "Is it a split? Is it a forkball? Whatever it is, you still can't hit it," says one NL hitter. "It seems he has two different ones -- one that falls off the table and another that moves away from you, with not as much down action. My theory is: pick one or the other. They're both filthy."

An AL scout compared Smoltz's slider with Robb Nen's: "Very tough on right-handed hitters, with late break and 89-91 mph velocity."

An NL scout gushed about his "fastball on the low, outside corner," which blows away right-handed hitters

And an AL scout cited Smoltz's increasing use of the splitter, which is really "becoming a weapon against left-handed hitters."

Is this the perfect, power closer's repertoire, or what?

Opponents are hitting .186 against Kim (143 hits, 293 strikeouts) in his career. Right-handed hitters are a ridiculous 72-for-434 (.166), with 185 whiffs. And the secret is the most unorthodox delivery in baseball -- and the most unorthodox pitch assortment.

"Forget the World Series," says his former teammate, Plesac. "He has the filthiest slider to a right-hander in baseball when he's on. It never stops breaking. And his 90-mph fastball from the down-under angle keeps hitters honest."

The Sweet 16

Advanced to second round

Invited to the dance