Pitcher's toe drag

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Nov 15, 2013
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My 10 year old daughter has a habit of not dragging just her toe when pitching. She drags almost her whole instep instead. I've read that this reduces power and I'm also worried that this will eventually lead to some foot and/or ankle injuries. Any suggestions or drills to help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
 
May 5, 2014
93
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Pacific Northwest
I have a 10 year old daughter that is leaping and then turns her foot and drags the hole thing sideways. Someone on this board had posted a very good suggestion. It was to drag her toes in the dirt like she was trying to wipe off a really bad toe nail polish, she got this. I also took some slow motion video of her leaping so she could see for herself what was going on. She had no idea her foot was coming off the ground that far. We worked on it just about every night for about 5 minutes for a couple weeks and she has just about trained her foot to stick her toes in the dirt and drag. I was a little surprised how hard it was to fix, muscle memory can be a tough thing to change. now only if we could get rid of the glove swim.
 
Sep 29, 2014
2,421
113
I would have her work on the toe drags as Woody suggested and she does not even have to pitch, so she can do these without a catcher or even having a net, she can just do the drive part as a drill. Here is a pretty good quad pic of what good drive might look like. The other thing is don't fret if she does turn foot a little and then the heel comes right back if the heel just touches then comes back or bounces off the dirt its not as big a deal we just don't want her heel dragging in the dirt. If she holds the heel drag too long it will actually effect her hip releasing correctly but I have to see to be sure.

gooddrive.jpg
 
Sep 29, 2014
2,421
113
The problem is not the foot. Start with the shoulders work down toward the hips and the foot will not be an issue.

To this point observe quad pic she is about to separate from plate and shoulders are square and the heel straight up not sideways.

Many pitchers have the nasty habit of turning their shoulder, hips and foot open as fast as possible which adversely effect all their mechanics downstream.
 
Feb 17, 2014
7,152
113
Orlando, FL
To this point observe quad pic she is about to separate from plate and shoulders are square and the heel straight up not sideways.

Many pitchers have the nasty habit of turning their shoulder, hips and foot open as fast as possible which adversely effect all their mechanics downstream.

Nasty does not even begin to describe it! Maybe not the worst fault, but certainly in the top 5. This is how skippies are born. :)
 
Let's try a very simple fix................land the stride foot at 45 degrees or less....maintain an erect upright posture. This will cause hip rotation which is what dictates the toe drag.The hips rotating will pull the heel up and put her on the inside of her toe. Note: the hip rotation needs to stop and stabilize just prior to release......the hips will "seek" the same angle as the landing foot.
 
Dec 16, 2010
172
18
My 10 year old daughter has a habit of not dragging just her toe when pitching.

I don't disagree with any of the previous advice, but here's what helped my dd in your situation. She did what you describe at early age 10. She leaped and dragged the side of her foot most pitches. She threw fairly hard (mid-hi 40s) but wild. And her coach wanted strikes.

Denny Tincher implemented a fix that worked for her immediately. I'll try to walk you through it.

Denny noted that while my dd had good (for a 10yr old) explosion off the rubber, she couldn't control her body afterwards. He said she needs to stride, but not try to explode off the rubber. More of a step and drag. The specific drive mechanics were pretty much the javasource 2-step with this exception: Instead of sliding her drive (pitching hand side) foot to center, she used a rocker motion ala Ueno.

Denny said (he proved correct) she would quickly become more aggressive with her push as she became comfortable.

Her control (and toe drag--she previously leaped and dragged the side of her foot) improved immediately. Once she started throwing strikes, quickly rose to the top of our pitching rotation.

Hope this helps.

PS - when she got a little older and her body control improved, she went back to max effort off the rubber. She still uses the javasource 2-step.
 
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