Northwestern Basketball Southpaw Throws First Pitch at White Sox Game
A towering lefty stood on the hill at Rate Field on Sunday donning a Chicago White Sox jersey, but it wasn't Garrett Crochet. He's gone to Boston. Instead, it was Northwestern Basketball star Nick Martinelli who was there to throw out the first pitch.
Northwestern Basketball posted a clip of Martinelli at the ballpark including the pitch itself on X yesterday.
The @whitesox have signed a 6’7” left-hander from Northwestern.
— Northwestern Basketball (@NUMensBball) June 8, 2025
Taking the mound, @N_Martinelli1 🤌 pic.twitter.com/VKZAejOWnb
It's a bit tough to tell from the video exactly where the pitch ended up, but it didn't look like a strike. Martinelli's facial expressions made that even more obvious.
But Martinelli's wind up was legendary. The high leg kick. The low arm-slot. The confident plant at the end. The Big Ten's leading scorer looked like a guy who'd thrown the ball around the yard a time or two in his day.
He may not have hit 80 mph like he said he thought he could before the pitch, but he definitely got some decent velocity on it. It wasn't a classic ceremonial first pitch lollipop toss. Even MLB pitchers throw a lot of balls, so the moral of the story is, it's all about how you look throwing it.
Martinelli made this public appearance just weeks after withdrawing his name from the NBA Draft and announcing his return to school. He will be Northwestern's unquestioned best player and team leader in 2025-26 as the 'Cats try to get back to the NCAA Tournament for the third time in four seasons.
For as solid as his pitching wind up looked, his flipper shot will always be his bread and butter. Northwestern's odds to make some noise in the Big Ten next year are much better with the lefty back in the program.
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Ryan Cole is a writer for Northwestern Wildcats On SI covering every team on campus. He’s currently a junior at NU where he’s studying journalism and previously wrote and edited for Inside NU. He also studies business with an eye towards eventually helping develop business models to revive local news. In his free time, Cole enjoys watching sports, playing sports, reading the news and singing.