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  1. W

    Proper Way to do Wrist Flip Drill

    The title is a bit of tongue-in-cheek bait. My newest project, IR5, wasn't really throwing with good IR technique. Her throws were more muscle and faux IR than a nice snap throw with the forearm rotation. Talking about it over and over did nothing to fix it. So, I came up with this drill. The...
  2. W

    Thanks DFP, European SB Player of the Year

    Thanks DFP (Boardmember, JavaSource, Rick Pauly). Three and half years ago I moved to Europe and somehow got caught up coaching the girls HS softball team here at Kapaun Air Base which is close to the city of Kaiserslautern Germany. When I got there the season was already half way finished. The...
  3. W

    For Beginning Bucket Dads - The art of pitching

    Thought I'd contribute a tip on how we practice pitching at the end of our sessions; might be of help to those trying to get control. We have a general grading system on every pitch as we simulate game situations towards the end of practice. Each pitch has four targets or goals: speed, location...
  4. W

    Increase Spin Speed

    IR2 and I have been working on increasing spin speed for a couple of weeks now. She's not a blazer, her drop ball comes in at a steady 50mph (I have a radar gun to go with my RevFire) and her spin rate is pretty consistent at 16rps with a nice 12-6 axis. It's a nice drop and she can throw it for...
  5. W

    Exploding off the rubber

    For quite a while I worked with one of my girls on getting a better drive off the rubber. We did countless two-step and push-back drills, hopping up and down stairs, dragging a bag around the field, etc; with minimal improvement. I'd read and reread Java's Drive Mechanics and watched all the...
  6. W

    The Rise is the Key

    Theory time for the long term contributors of this forum. I've listened/watched to plenty of pitching clinics from Cat, Finch, etc. None advocate IR mechanics. They teach how they were taught giving no thoughts to how they actually pitch. They are pitchers, not instructors. But how did they...
  7. W

    Plant Mechanics

    We've got Board Members' Whip Mechanics (IR) and JavaSource's Drive Mechanics stickys. What we need is a sticky on Plant Mechanics. Too many videos posted by parents of young girls having poor whip mechanics and drive mechanics yet their plant mechanics are just as bad. Usually someone with...
  8. W

    Help with a Bullet Spin

    One of my pitchers has developed a bullet spin on her fastball. During warm-up throws she has a nice 1 to 7 spin. But when she drives off the rubber it's a bullet spin. I've attached a clip, the first half is just circle warm ups with a nice 1 to 7 stripe. The second half of the clip is her...
  9. W

    Nice Picture

    Nice Pictures Show the ball, arms symmetrical, hips open, on target. Whips like there's no tomorrow. Now if I could stop that fricken bullet spin! BTW, wife took this picture from the stands in yesterday's game.
  10. W

    Riseball versus the Swing Plane

    I noticed one of our posters started up the dreaded "Does a Riseball Rise?" topic...again. Thought I'd throw my two-cents in but not in a manner that has been discussed before. What is a riseball and why is it the seemingly be-all end-all pitches for softball players? The answer is...the swing...
  11. W

    Oops - First Day of Practice

  12. W

    Top HS Prospects, 2014, SoCal Invitational

    Nice little jewel of a video I found. Okay men, and women, here are the top prospects in SoCal, I'm sure all of them need our help.
  13. W

    Learning to Throw Underhand versus Learning to Pitch

    I offer this video to help those learning to teach their DD how to pitch. Before learning to pitch a girl should first learn how to throw a ball underhand. This is not the same a pitching. In fact, the amount of time it takes to teach a boy or girl to throw overhand properly is comparable to the...
  14. W

    Hip Snap/Shoulder-Hip Disassociation

    This is one of the areas I'm trying to improve one of my pitchers, disassociating the hips from the shoulder for a better whip. The hips should fire at plant with the shoulders twisted out of alignment to the hips. This creates core torque for better snap through the backside of the circle...
  15. W

    12 Months Worth of Work

    This is IR2; twelve months ago she couldn't pitch a lick, in fact she didn't last one inning in the only inning she pitched her freshman year. Her mother made me promise I'd never put her on the mound again until she could pitch. I was the classic bowling-style bucket-dad pitching coach--then I...
  16. W

    9:00 Drill hitting 20RPS

    Today I broke out the RevFire and checked IR2's spin rate on both the 9:00 drill and full circle (stepping). I was pleasantly surprised to find her spinning at 20RPS with a nice 1 to 7 spin axis on the 9:00 drill. I was equally dismayed to see the spin drop to 17RPS in the full circle throws...
  17. W

    MLB Tim Lincecum pitching with IR

    One of my many tasks as assistant HS coach is to actually teach girls how to throw overhand properly, how to whip with their arms and bodies. It's not as easy as it sounds. Most girls want to push the ball right past their ear. I teach a three quarter whip and I teach it sequentially just as I...
  18. W

    Help with Bullet Spin

    Okay gurus of gurus, my IR1 has a bullet spin problem. We line up the middle finger with the stripe yet, from what I can tell, she's letting the ball roll off the side of the pointer finger as she comes through release. I'll post her first and then me. We're just throwing underhand, no real...
  19. W

    IR1, IR2, and IR3 Getting better

    I've got three pitchers I'm working with all coming along nicely. We're just working on whip and rotation from the nine o'clock. The first pitcher, IR1, gets a nice whip and rotation but too many bullet spins. These are shot with my Nikon 1 at 400 fps with sunlight streaming in from some windows.
  20. W

    Thinking Outside the Box

    I think this is an important video to share. Yes, I know it's not pitching...but it's related very closely...it's the value of thinking outside the box. Not doing things the conventional way, forging a different path. Every great advancement in the history of man can be attributed to those...

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