50mph or Bust

[Beeg]

DD is still not 5 ft yet, and that's growing 3 inches recently. The team just moved up to 14U, and her top speed is only 47mph. Wow, from the comments here, maybe she shouldn't pitch at all.

Her pitching coach (he works with many great pitchers) says he is not concerned with her speed. He wants her to continue to work on her mechanics and posture. Once she hits puberty, the speed will come. She can move the ball easily, and that's all he wants to see now. He wouldn't even clock her speed (I bought a radar gun recently to clock it) b/c he doesn't want her to injure herself trying to throw fast when her body isn't ready yet. She just pitched a no hitter at the state tournament semi-final game against a very good team. She moves the ball so much the batters couldn't figure out how to hit it. Her teammate, who pitches mid-50s, pitched the championship game, but after the 2nd inning, the batters was able to time off her and kept getting runs.

DD may never go beyond 5'3", so her mechanics is very important if she wants to continue to pitch in HS.

 

[BT3100]

DD is still not 5 ft yet, and that's growing 3 inches recently. The team just moved up to 14U, and her top speed is only 47mph. Wow, from the comments here, maybe she shouldn't pitch at all.

Her pitching coach (he works with many great pitchers) says he is not concerned with her speed. He wants her to continue to work on her mechanics and posture. Once she hits puberty, the speed will come. She can move the ball easily, and that's all he wants to see now. He wouldn't even clock her speed (I bought a radar gun recently to clock it) b/c he doesn't want her to injure herself trying to throw fast when her body isn't ready yet. She just pitched a no hitter at the state tournament semi-final game against a very good team. She moves the ball so much the batters couldn't figure out how to hit it. Her teammate, who pitches mid-50s, pitched the championship game, but after the 2nd inning, the batters was able to time off her and kept getting runs.

DD may never go beyond 5'3", so her mechanics is very important if she wants to continue to pitch in HS.

She can go as far in the sport as she wants to according to her desire and work ethic. All that said she needs to work on her speed a lot. My DD is a small framed girl who would get overlooked at camps due to her size. It took her years to hit 60 consistently. As a sophomore at Pennsbury she hit 62. After that the coaches started showing up at games. Now she is not a power pitcher, and uses change up more that any other pitch but pitching at 60-61 makes all pitches move better and with a change up 61 is plenty. I have seen girls who's coaches told them that speed doesn't matter. That's a lie, any kid can throw 60 with proper mechanics and a reasonable amount of strength. Speed must be worked on in-spite of what some coaches say.

 

[radness]

She can go as far in the sport as she wants to according to her desire and work ethic. All that said she needs to work on her speed a lot. My DD is a small framed girl who would get overlooked at camps due to her size. It took her years to hit 60 consistently. As a sophomore at Pennsbury she hit 62. After that the coaches started showing up at games. Now she is not a power pitcher, and uses change up more that any other pitch but pitching at 60-61 makes all pitches move better and with a change up 61 is plenty. I have seen girls who's coaches told them that speed doesn't matter. That's a lie, any kid can throw 60 with proper mechanics and a reasonable amount of strength. Speed must be worked on in-spite of what some coaches say.

What age to reach 55 & 60?

 

[julray]

I set an ultimatum for DD last winter when looking for a new team due to unforeseen circumstances. She was 2nd yr 12U, but there were several decent opportunities at 14U she was interested in. At the time I told her 14U is another level and her game fastball speed needs to be 50mph minimum with the movement pitches not far off that or i wouldn't allow her to move up. She ended up with a good 12U team and had a successful season so crisis averted.
Now that DD's moving up to 13U and her pitch speeds are still not quite there, what to do about the ultimatum I set 6 months ago.
The main reason for the 50mph limit was the need for her pitches to be harder to hit. She's been tattooed by a couple line drives in the last yr and I dont want her head taken off after hanging a 45mph fastball in the zone.

Getting to 50mph is not going to solve that problem.. having a good change up and other junk will keep the hitters guessing and prevent them from squaring up so much. Not that a pitchers goal should not be to get faster, but if a pitcher has a great change up, the 45mph fastball will look like a 60mph fastball. Focus on throwing junk with good pitch placement. Be comfortable throwing a change up 1st pitch or behind in the count. Be unpredictable, the speed will come as she gets stronger and works at it.

Personally I think the pressure of an ultimatum is not a good thing, set a goal instead and make it fun.. just my two cents

 

[BT3100]

What age to reach 55 & 60?

That's a great question.. And age is really not the most important factor even though coaches and parents think it is. It's maturity. Some girls are fully mature at 14 while others aren't done growing until 18. You see some girls who are over 5 feet tall at 11 while some grow 4 inches from 15 to 16. It's less about age and more about maturity. We've all see girls who dominate at 12 then fade and aren't pitching at 16. Why? Many times they reach their peak early and either stop working or just can't get any better, while the undersized or late bloomers continue to improve and pass them. We have been lucky to have great coaches throughout the years. Some were great because they didn't believe in DD when she needed a kick in the butt.. Others who told her to master a new pitch every year. Right now at 17 and a senior she is working on a drop ball... never had a great one.. Has all the others.. but no drop. After 4 months it's killer... she will be facing kids at HS and travel who know her well but never seen a drop from her. Gotta have great coaches.. us parents have no idea what we are talking about...

 

[Vertigo]

Right now at 17 and a senior she is working on a drop ball... never had a great one.. Has all the others.. but no drop. After 4 months it's killer... she will be facing kids at HS and travel who know her well but never seen a drop from her. Gotta have great coaches.. us parents have no idea what we are talking about...

Nice!! Same with my dd. Never had a drop until now. Had a DC, but a great drop that falls off the table keeps the ball in the IF. Good luck this season!!

 

[BT3100]

Nice!! Same with my dd. Never had a drop until now. Had a DC, but a great drop that falls off the table keeps the ball in the IF. Good luck this season!!

You too!!!!!!

 

[Shiloh]

And age is really not the most important factor even though coaches and parents think it is. It's maturity. Some girls are fully mature at 14 while others aren't done growing until 18. You see some girls who are over 5 feet tall at 11 while some grow 4 inches from 15 to 16. It's less about age and more about maturity. We've all see girls who dominate at 12 then fade and aren't pitching at 16. Why? Many times they reach their peak early and either stop working or just can't get any better, while the undersized or late bloomers continue to improve and pass them.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^THIS^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

FWIW....

Our story. I hope it helps:

DD grew early and fast. Absolute dominant pitcher in 10/12U. Could throw 50+ first year 10U. She was 5'4"/145lbs in 2nd grade! Taller than her teacher.

And then, as she approached and went through middle school...everyone caught up. By second year 14U she was pitcher #3 and having to rely on her bat for playing time. In search of answers, we switched pitching coaches and learned IR from one of the best. That took a year.

Once IR was mastered by early 16U, and movement started to come back, she still couldn't throw much over 55mph. Pitching coach was scratching his head, said he couldn't teach speed, only mechanics and spin. So overall, HE to IR, but only about 3-4mph of gain in 5 years!

I posted video on DFP asking for help at the time. The clear problem was leg drive...lack of it. She spent months working with each of two different trainers, didn't really help. Incremental improvement and she was working 24/7. Dedicated her life to it, and nothing. 55-56mph during first year 18s

Heartbreaking.

And then...

I read the DFP thread on quad dominance ("hyperarch mechanism"). Googled quad vs glute dominance and learned as much as I could. Lightbulb went on; it all started to make sense. She was quad dominant and no amount of work on her own (sprints, long toss, weighs, etc etc) would fix it.

Serendipity intervened and we got hooked up with a very good baseball trainer. One look and he said "she's badly imbalanced. I can fix it." Said it would take 3 months to adjust, 6 mos to see a change and a year to realize the full benefit.

He was right.

It's been almost exactly a year with this trainer and she's still in the gym 5 days a week, with sprints, agility, and other drills on her own in addition to team practice, but is now capable of 63-64mph. Although not yet consistent at that speed, she cruises at 60-62 and it's becoming apparent she will be able to sustain mid-60s by next summer. Says she can feel it coming on, and by the gun we can see episodes of 64 that are more and more frequent. In-game results have improved dramatically (now #1 pitcher on a nationally competitive 18U team). She'll play mid-level D3 ball in college because of the school but has turned down a mid-major D1 and a top D3 offer.

Nothing is ever straight up and to the right. But with enough work, insane luck and DFP we got to the breakthrough.

So thank you DFP!

PS - she posted the best BA on her team after an 11 game tourney last week. Leg drive is good for hitting too

 

[STRIKE3]

I see a few inefficiencies in her video.
1. Doesn't drive out. She is more of a reach upward.
2. Upper arm is very unstable, and as a result the lower half of her arm doesn't accelerate. (No upper brush and compression)
3. Fails to stabilize her body through release. Steps through the release.

Correct these 3 things and you'll get faster almost instantly

Hope this helps, Coach James

Late to this thread party and reading through just waiting for somebody to say this. Thank you @coach james and absolutely the 1st thing that I noticed but always the first thing I am looking for anyway when speed is in question. IMO it is first on the list and the others closely follow. In other words, if you can't simply throw underhand well (notice I said throw and not pitch) then adding the other things won't help much. You have to learn to learn the mechanics of underhand throwing first.....and then you can learn to pitch.

@fistafury17 ...... go back to I/R in the Classroom and simply read the very 1st post by @BoardMember on July 1, 2012. Again, it is the very 1st post of this thread. Read it, read it again, and then a 3rd, 4th, and 5th time. And then repeat several times. Understand upper arm stability in this thread. Probably the most important post by anyone regarding pitching on this entire site. Read it and understand it.

@fistafury17 I promise you my friend you will take your DD to a different level almost overnight if you can get her to do this.

Happy Labor Day Weekend everyone! And thanks again @coach james for your post!

S3

 

[BT3100]

Never forget!!!