College pitching accuracy

JJsqueeze said:

As for HBPs, how long until someone starts head hunting the Florida batters with the BS they are pulling? it happened again during the Alabama game, an arm over the chalk got skimmed for a HBP.

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JJsqueeze said:

As for HBPs, how long until someone starts head hunting the Florida batters with the BS they are pulling? it happened again during the Alabama game, an arm over the chalk got skimmed for a HBP.

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JAD said:

The UF batters all wear those guards and "lean into" inside pitches. The umpires have finally caught on and are now calling them strikes instead of HBP. If the umpires had not fixed the problem I bet a couple of hot headed pitchers would have thrown a few "middle of the back" fastballs.

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sleepwalker said:

Sleepwalkers 2 cents on college pitching accuracy,

25 plus years ago, I saw the same thing happen at the Jr. College baseball leagues in the Pacific Northwest. There was an appearance that the quality of men's baseball pitching was on the decliine because of the increased walks that were being seen at the JUCO level. The scores to the baseball games were becoming double digit affairs, and it wasn't uncommon to see 5 to 8 walks per 9 inning game by both teams. There were several discussions at the ballparks that the qualilty of pitching was slowly declining over the years and that hitters were getting better, as evidenced by the increased number of teams that had 1 through 9 hitters batting averages all hovering at or above .300.

During that same period of time, I witnessed a pitcher take a line drive to the head that knocked him unconscious during a Pacific Northwest Juco Championship tournament, otherwise known as an NWAACC tournament. An ambulance crew that was onsite, took the pitcher to the hospital, where he recovered and even continued to pitch into the Major Leagues.

Discussion took place about the aluminum bats, performance bats, or hot bats that were in the game and the safety of the players in the NWAACC. A few years later, the Northwest Athletic Association of Community Colleges went to a wood bat league and guess what happened? The number of walks went down considerably. 1 through 9 hitters could no longer hit rockets off of their wood bats and batting averages decreased. Pitchers didn't have to pitch around every 1 through 9 hitter. Pitcher accuracy returned immediately because pitchers didn't have to worry about the possibility of every hitter being able to hit it out of the ball park. Small ball returned to Juco baseball when the high performance bats were removed from the game. Similar results occurred when the high performance bats were removed from the 4 year college baseball game a couple/few years back.

I think pitching at the women's college softball level is as good or better than it has ever been. I think that the reason that the accuracy of the pitching appears to be down and walks appear to be up is because the women's college softball pitchers are having to pitch around every hitter because of the high performance bats. I think that the college pitcher is purposely throwing balls in order to keep the softballs in the field of play and to keep their teams in the game.

I would be willing to bet that if the high performance bat was taken out of the game of softball, that the appearance of accuracy of the pitchers would be fixed over night. Pitchers would go after hitters more aggressively. I am willing to bet that I would see less 0-2 waste pitches out of the strike zone to number 6, 7, 8, and 9 hitters when there are no runners on base. I am willing to bet that batting averages would go down, because the number of line drives that get out of the infield with a performance bat would not get out of the infield with a non performance bat. Without the performance bats, would they still teach the split grip to entire teams? Is pitcher accuracy really down, or is being a college pitcher in 2015 an extremely difficult challenge to every young college pitcher and only getting worse because of the high performance bats?

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Greenmonsters said:

There is an alternate explanation that may be worth considering. The tightening the NCAA approved bat list and ABI testing have effectively and progressively eliminated the hot performing bats since 2008, when ABI was implemented. Some of the control issues observed today may well be a product of a growing "love affair with speed" which inherently favors hard throwers over pitchers. IMO, the increased emphasis on speed has been brought about by the increasingly widespread use of radar guns and the often misplaced belief that fire-balling college-aged pitchers can be taught control and therefore have a higher ceiling than their slower throwing spin/control pitchers. Just the same as in baseball, the 100-mph arm attracts the most attention.

Just something to think about....

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knightsb said:

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knightsb said:

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Out in Left Field said:

Every year the pitchers are wild at the beginning. (One of the reasons baseball is asking for the season to be moved back, lack of time to prepare/weather. Even lacrosse on tv was complaining about the weather this year.) Imagine throwing that hard and combining spin, and being asked to transition from pitch type to pitch type repeatedly. The rule change has nothing to do with it. The pitcher should not be throwing pitches into the batter's box. That's pitching 101.

I do think the pitchers are being taught to paint the corner too much and they, in particular, get away with poor riseballs in HS. Or they get away with leaning on one or twto pitches only. No one is making them learn before college, but letting them get by. So college can be a shock to the system.

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3bmama said:

Ummmmm......

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