Frustrated

I am frustrated with DD right now in games. She has always thrown close to practice speed in games. For some reason she is taking speed off the pitch. We worked a lot since October and changed some things and added pitches. She is throwing a fantastic drop ball in practice. A good change up, and has always been good with a FB. In games she is throwing 5-6 mph under practice speed which she's never done before. The lack of speed makes her drop ball a slow fastball with no movement. FB is going high because she isn't using arm speed. Riseball is looking better in practice. Getting lots of rpm and pop. In a game, no speed and no spin. Not sure if it's the move to 12U. 10U she could beat the players with FB, FB location, and a change up.

You gotta drop the frustration. This is the single HARDEST YEAR for a pitcher. Bigger ball, 5 more feet, that year from 11-12 is a growth spurt year so the second year girls are a lot bigger and stronger. Pitchers are facing a lot of headwind that year. This is the year that a lot of girls give up pitching because they go from REC ball strikeout queens to TB run generators, even in TB the best girls from 10U are very hittable that first year of 12s. So stay positive for her and keep on the DFP pitching path and the second year will be much better. There is literally nothing she can do to regain her 10U dominance and unless she is a phenom it will never happen, she will have more success as she grows but she will NEVER BE ABLE TO DOMINATE A LINEUP the way she did in 10s. If you don't believe me, go to gamechanger and look at some of the pitching stats for the top teams in the nation, you will see that girls that are D1 committed are by and large maybe striking out 3-5 girls a game, sometimes they will own a lineup but mostly they live on weakly hit balls fielded by strong defenses, I am sure these same girls were untouchable when they were 10.

The best thing you can do is just support her through it and not make it seem like she is doing something wrong, if her speed is off between practice and games then work on it but be sure you understand what realistic expectations are. You job this year is to keep her practicing and improving, supporting her through a tough year and that is all.

My kid got absolutely blasted the first year of 12s, I don't get much right but I am really proud of all the encouragement I gave her during those dark times, when coaches told her she got hit because she threw a pitch fat, I would let her know that sometimes good hitters just hit the ball hard and until she gets some speed increases as she grows, she is going to get clobbered. Seriously, there are MANY idiot coaches that REALLY think that any hard hit ball is a pitchers fault and have no problem letting an 11 year old know it.

My support of her that year was probably the best thing I did for her, far more important that anything we did in practice. I am largely out of the picture now on DDs softball development, it happened kind of quickly, and I am sort of going through withdrawals, but man am I proud of the bond we have that we forged that first year of 12s. Also, the struggle she had that year helped in the long run with staying mentally tough, I swear my kid could go into the circle and get absolutely shelled and a bystander walking by might think she is throwing a no hitter, because she has been there done that and got the T shirt by being crushed for a full year as an 11 year old and she knows that it will never be that bad again.


as for the speed difference, is this from a gun or is this eyeballing it? I remember my DD looking so slow that first year in games, it is common for a kid to throw a couple mph slower in games, 5-6 would be a lot. It could have something to do with the practice surface as well, my DD used to practice on a rubber mat over cement and she probably pitched 3-4 mph slower in games but we switched to a plate in the dirt and it helped even things out a little.

It is a self filling prophesy.

Practice is great but they will fall back to what they are comfortable with in games.

She probably knows and it will sneak in slowly.

Now I'm scared and also happy we have another year of 10U.

grcsftbll said:

Now I'm scared and also happy we have another year of 10U.

Click to expand...

They all go through this.
Relax... My DD was lucky to have enough speed in her first year of 12u that she was able to do well not throwing 100%.
We were playing usssa tournaments. This season were playing Pony and it's much tougher competition. Now if she takes something off of her FB it gets juiced.
Her PC helped her with her speed. She said it's a trust issue... which I believe. She told my kid to throw your hardest to the first batter in the game. If you are lacking control one walk won't kill ya.
After a few times of doing that she now gets it up there at practice speed.

By the way I think it is the batters, they get a lot better.

It takes the P a little time to adjust,

It's definitely my DD slowing down. I know she is going to give up hits but she would give up a lot less pitching like she does in practice. I am going to give the throw it as hard as you can to first batter pep talk. In practice the drop ball doesn't look hitable. It's cutting at the front of the box mid knee and down 16" at the catcher. Growing pains!