at a range of

[CaseyA]

Some blog.

Romero throws a two seamer in the high 80's and low 90's. His four-seam fastball ranges from 92-95 miles per hour and his changeup is thrown at a range of 82–87 miles per hour.

Shouldn't it be "is thrown at a speed in a range of"? I thought you can only have some speed "in a range of....."

[5jj]

Casey, I have no desire at all to put a damper on your interest in accuracy in English, but some of your questions are about things that would not worry the average native speaker. What follows is my personal opinion; others may not agree.

At one end of the scale of 'correct English' we have "his ball is throwed in a speed of 80 miles per hour." Here we have two clear breaches of the 'rules' of standard English:
1. 'throwed' is an incorrect formation of the past participle. Such mistakes are often made by native speakers who have not yet learnt, or are not bothered about, such slips; they may even be common in some dialects.
2. 'in' is not the appropriate preposition with '... a speed of...'. This mistake is normally made only by non-native speakers.

At the other end of the scale, we have things which concern style as much as grammar, and there are sometimes heated arguments about what is 'good' English. Here we are into the area of such things as the acceptablity of 'under the circumstances' - there are those who claim that, because of the etymology, we must use 'in'. There are those who argue that 'miles per hour' is wrong, because we should not mix Latin and English; we should say 'miles an hour'. Similarly, they say, we can say 'per diem' or 'a day', but not 'per day'. The topic of your question is in this area, in my opinion. Most native speakers do not worry about such things, and continue using forms that are completely acceptable to all but a few style gurus.

The gurus would not like "is thrown at a range of 82–87 miles per hour". Very few readers would notice anything amiss. In any case, If American sports writers are anything like their British colleagues, they will happily use words and constructions that make an English teacher shudder.

[CaseyA]

So the original example is not okay?

[CaseyA]

"The ball could be thrown at 100mph". I am fine with that.
"The ball could be thrown at 80, 90, and 100mph". I am fine with that too.
"The ball could be thrown at a/the range of 80-100mph". That's what bothers me.

"A/The range of" seems to be a wrapper around a group of numbers. To access those number, I thought I need some word phrase like "speeds", with the "correct" sentence being:
"The ball could be thrown at speeds in a/the range of 80-100mph". Not correct?

[Raymott]

"The ball could be thrown at speeds in a/the range of 80-100mph". Not correct?

That is one correct way of saying it. 5jj has explained the rest.

[emsr2d2]

So the original example is not okay?

I think you should read fivejedjon's reply again. He made several very good points, all well explained, and they should not have led you to such a simplistic assumption as "So the original is not okay?" (We usually use "OK", by the way.)