I heard one of our coaches say: "At 14u, the girls no longer need to see live pitching in practices." At 12u, I think we saw live pitching in practices maybe 4 times the entire year so this should not have surprised me, but of course it did. I about had an eternal meltdown when I heard this. No surprise, we are not a high scoring team. I love the coaches in terms of their ability to coach and how they treat the girls. I scratch my head at these notions.
If not done properly, live pitching and hitting can bog down a practice, but it still has to be done occasionally...especially before the first game of the year when the girls have not seen a 50 mph pitch in 1.5 months. There is no way they are going to have their timing down.
So am I just crazy? My daughter has seen or participated in practices with a few A teams, and they were hitting live pitches in practice just about every time I saw them. One team we saw had it as a station - the girls got 8-10 swings and that was it.
If not done properly, live pitching and hitting can bog down a practice, but it still has to be done occasionally...especially before the first game of the year when the girls have not seen a 50 mph pitch in 1.5 months. There is no way they are going to have their timing down.
So am I just crazy? My daughter has seen or participated in practices with a few A teams, and they were hitting live pitches in practice just about every time I saw them. One team we saw had it as a station - the girls got 8-10 swings and that was it.