Need some advice on Youtube's Fastpitch Power Techniques

Hi;

I'm still looking for the best method to teach my U12 softball team especially the pitching technique. I already have two Bill Hillhouse dvds, Building the House and The Pitches. But I still got confuse with various ways of pitching techniques that I saw from international players on Youtube.

I stumbled upon a collection of pitching instruction by a generous man that share various informations about pitching. Here it is:

Fastpitch Power - YouTube

The technique is quite convincing. I hope someone can give me some advice either I should concentrate on his techniques or not. Please PM me your advices (I hope BM and Bill Hillhouse read this thread).

Thanks.

In short, there's nothing to be convinced of. The markets is flooded with stuff ($$$). The information is here with what the elite female pitchers do and supported by experts with invaluable in site. Been here for over 4 years. Don't be fooled.

Zul77,

Do a search on here using the google option above and type in "forearm fire". The site you reference features a father/daughter duo. I think the daughter has a few good things to offer... and you'll get a full commentary from BM if you do the search. Put your seatbelt on...

JS

Zul77 said:

Hi;

I'm still looking for the best method to teach my U12 softball team especially the pitching technique. I already have two Bill Hillhouse dvds, Building the House and The Pitches. But I still got confuse with various ways of pitching techniques that I saw from international players on Youtube.

I stumbled upon a collection of pitching instruction by a generous man that share various informations about pitching. Here it is:

Fastpitch Power - YouTube

The technique is quite convincing. I hope someone can give me some advice either I should concentrate on his techniques or not. Please PM me your advices (I hope BM and Bill Hillhouse read this thread).

Thanks.

Click to expand...

Here is my personal review...........

The simple fact is that very much of Coach Phil's information comes from THIS SITE..........Often embellishing the information into an instructional video..........

Sometimes the information he "re-packages" and/or "re-names" from this site is accurate........Sometimes it isn't. Because it's HIS OWN interpretation of that information shared here. Part of the problem is he's not a pitcher. He's never thrown a pitch at any level above his instructional snippets........And it becomes obvious when you watch his bio-mechanics in demonstration..........

I can't begin to tell you how many of his "Video Blogs" are filmed and published sometime AFTER that exact information was discussed here on this site. In short, he uses much of what is discussed on this site by advanced level instructors to formulate his information and then re-packages/re-distributes that information under sometimes different terms/pet names to make it his own.......

I can't tell you how many people watch his clips and then write me to tell me about the obvious plagiarism of information I've discussed on here before his clips are published.

Here's what I will tell you. His "Forearm Fire" was plagiarized directly from my I/R thread........His "Hand action series part 1" clip was plagiarized directly from my I/R in the classroom thread. His "hitting and forearm fire" clip was a direct result of my "bat drill for pitchers".......All published LONG AFTER I made the information available on this site.......

The GOOD THING is that he has taken/extracted much/all of the important information discussed on this site and put it into video's that DO NOT require reading through all chaff to find the wheat.........Or digging though the "hay stacks" to find the needles............ The bad thing is in making some of it "his own" he's twisted some of it in the wrong direction.......

I don't have the time to dissect what is the best and what is the worst of "Fastpich Power"........And like ALL information available out there, and all the different theories and methods, the best advice I can give you is to pick through what makes sense to you.......Try it......And keep what works and throw out what doesn't..........

SO.........With all that said...........I've seen a lot of his video-blog clips........I would categorize them as generally Ok.......But his interpretations and embellishments are not always the best, or even correct mechanically.......Especially stuff like this example of an "elbow snapping" move that doesn't exist in any high level delivery:



Coach Phil has made a business of teaching the fastpitch motion. IMO he's done a generally decent job of categorizing that information into teachable segments.

He appears likable, and he speaks generally well in his videos, using clear and concise verbiage to get his points across, which makes his "sales-ability" factor "believable".........Which is a good quality in both an instructor, and a used car salesman........It's up to you to decide whether that car is worth investing in........It could be a diamond in the rough.......Or a lemon........

SHOW ME THE CAR FAX!

He repeats himself way too much to have ever coached kids. I don't see how they would remain focused.

-W

Thanks guys for your advices.

Get Hillhouses' Tricks of the Trade. Keep it simple.

Went to the link mentioned above for "Phil"..........looked at the first 2 minutes of two videos on how to spin the ball (screwball/dropball).
Had to quick turn it off 'cause it made me not feel well.........the well-intentioned young lady doing the demo and Phil have obviously never pitched or watched video of the very elite pitchers in the world. My recommendation on this short viewing is to never use the techniques shown on these videos unless you subscribe to being very mediocre.

Should I begin to feel better I may return to see if there is any useful info on these videos.

Rick Pauly said:

Went to the link mentioned above for "Phil"..........looked at the first 2 minutes of two videos on how to spin the ball (screwball/dropball).
Had to quick turn it off 'cause it made me not feel well.........the well-intentioned young lady doing the demo and Phil have obviously never pitched or watched video of the very elite pitchers in the world. My recommendation on this short viewing is to never use the techniques shown on these videos unless you subscribe to being very mediocre.

Should I begin to feel better I may return to see if there is any useful info on these videos.

Click to expand...

Any specific examples of what you didn't like?

First let me say that OLF has a point.....I was probably a little harsh in my assessment. The young lady may be a very good pitcher who excelled with technique different than what I would teach.......there are many ways to skin a cat.

To better phrase my post I should have said that the (brief) viewing of the two videos was displaying some "highly trained" movements/release actions and that would give a viewer a different understanding of what happens as the ball is released than what really does happen. For a beginning pitcher I would keep things much simpler........for a more advanced pitcher there could be something there that would get something to click after having exhausted other avenues.....but again, it would not be my preferred starting point.
To OLF's other point I'd kick it up a notch from NPF and check out recent Olympic pitchers like Osterman, Abbott, Finch, Ueno, Lawrie. Each of these has some very distinct "style" differences but their release actions tend to fit into a narrow range and are less "trained".
Don't have a great definition of "trained".....maybe "muscled" is another description.

FiveFrameSwing said:

Any specific examples of what you didn't like?

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