Riseball spin

[pumpkinbear]

But back to my question. How does that spin stack up with real world riseballs? If she can get that consistently can we call it game ready?

If you're referring to the spin you show in #427, my opinion is that it is game ready and superior to bullet spin. Just my opinion--I know you followed the long discussions involving pobguy on this and I don't think my opinion has been proven. Not many girls (in my area at least) can produce this spin.

 

[Ken B]

Well I think that is about what my dds is doing too - when she gets more true back spin it ends up a lot slower, but when she has the rotation you are talking about it has better speed and good movement I think. Ken B has seen it and he thinks it's passable when it's coming in fast enough, etc. with that spin. She also showed it to another older very experienced coach who pitched himself and coaches i/r. He immediately liked it and said that is what we were looking for, he said it doesn't get much better than that, especially at this age. Let's get Ken to pipe in here!!

I was just going to say that I've seen girls get that spin before I saw your post! Lil DD was goofing around last night with spins and had a few with some back spin. (Proud daddy moment.)

Rich Balswick and others sware that backspin is not only possible, but preferable. He'll also say it is slower. I have never seen decent and effective game-speed backspin, but have no where near as many games/videos watched as FFS.

 

[Greenmonsters]

But back to my question. How does that spin stack up with real world riseballs? If she can get that consistently can we call it game ready?

Stop and think about it for a minute. If the initial trajectory and speed are similar to her fastball, but it consistently moves differently than her fastball...........then why wouldn't you use it in a game? The spin axis might be a work in progress and not yet riseball optimal, but if it moves different than her FB and can throw a hitter's timing off, who cares what you call it if its effective. Just throw it.

 

[JJsqueeze]

Stop and think about it for a minute. If the initial trajectory and speed are similar to her fastball, but it consistently moves differently than her fastball...........then why wouldn't you use it in a game? The spin axis might be a work in progress and not yet riseball optimal, but if it moves different than her FB and can throw a hitter's timing off, who cares what you call it if its effective. Just throw it.

That is way too logical.

 

[colin]

jj i am interested in how your dd practices her riseball to get to that spin. double ball?

 

[JJsqueeze]

We just reversed chained it from soft underhand tosses from about 10 feet with a concentration on spin.

BMs video on the rise - the around the barrel concept and grip he showed were very helpful.

Also I learned to throw the spin (not with any significant speed). But just going through the process of learning how to get that spin on a full circle was really helpful. With the rise, there are a couple of mechanics that will kill it in the cradle if you don't get them right IMO. Being open is crucial as it gives you just a tad more time to keep the fingers working under and up before I/R Forces the hand behind the ball. This little amount of time is very important in turning bullet spin into a little bit of back spin.

The other thing is posture. If you don't have a nose behind the belly button angle to the body then you can't get a good release angle. You don't have to exaggerate it, but it needs to be there just a little. You can't be stacked on the front foot.

It took me a few months to be able to throw some back spin with a full circle and then I just started showing her how I did it.

Ironically her first breakthrough came on a day when we were focusing on pulling the ball down palm to the sky. She was focused on the palm after some spin practice and she started popping of palm up curves and riseball spins consistently. We grouped these together by the way. We started working on both at the same time. I tend to group things together and the riseball and palm up curve seem to be sister pitches so we just kind of play with both.

Another cue that I stumbled on was to release earlier. Counterintuitive but if you don't get the hand working up the front early then your hand turns and you get full bullet every time.

 

[Ken B]

Also I learned to throw the spin (not with any significant speed). But just going through the process of learning how to get that spin on a full circle was really helpful. With the rise, there are a couple of mechanics that will kill it in the cradle if you don't get them right IMO. Being open is crucial as it gives you just a tad more time to keep the fingers working under and up before I/R Forces the hand behind the ball. This little amount of time is very important in turning bullet spin into a little bit of back spin.

Good stuff!

 

[humpty]

Can someone post bm rise ball video.

 

[colin]

http://www.discussfastpitch.com/sof...eam-rise-wrist-flexion-barrel.html#post247645

 

[NVfishing]

[video]https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=em-upload_owner&v=YMYdGorWkfY[/video]

Filming from catching position. Looks very high from that perspective but it was just out of zone.