About the Drop

[Quasimodo]

I'm fascinated how you seem to know this to be true. While I've never seen a screwball, I've seen a million inside pitches that 2 time Olympic Gold Medalist Michele Smith calls a screwball. But that doesn't mean it did what she said. So, if she is misidentifying anything inside for a 'screwball' then it's easy to mischaracterize a drop as a "Fastball" , especially if it's not breaking sharply on that day or on that particular pitch. Plus, I'm guessing WCWS, primetime game, on ESPN, capacity crowd cheering, etc. would jack the pitcher up and create a lot of "over throwing" which makes balls stay flat: giving a drop less movement making it look like she intended for it to be straight.

I think Michele is being generous, perhaps looking at basic form rather than function. I have seen Yukiko Ueno throw curve-balls that corkscrewed and didn't move an inch. Just stepping left and throwing inside isn't a screwball to me, but most are exactly that. And that is why the left-field fence loves an over-used screwball.

 

[Hillhouse]

I think Michele is being generous, perhaps looking at basic form rather than function. I have seen Yukiko Ueno throw curve-balls that corkscrewed and didn't move an inch. Just stepping left and throwing inside isn't a screwball to me, but most are exactly that. And that is why the left-field fence loves an over-used screwball.

I disagree. I think 2 Time Olympic Gold Medalist Michele Smith and her broadcast partner(s) just see where the ball ends up and then call the pitch by that name. Anything high is a rise, low is a drop, etc. Regardless of the rotation, movement, etc. Just just where the catcher catches it for most of them. More than 1/2 the time they misidentify change ups when it has a similar spin as something else. Someone with a really good forward spinning change, they would often call those dropballs instead of seeing how fooled the batter was by the speed. Again, this is from just seeing where the ball ends up instead of what actually happened.

 

[Tatonka]

And this is one of the biggest tragedies in the sport. Why catchers can't be taught to call their own games, and pitchers learning what to throw and when instead of mindlessly getting their info from someone with a clipboard who has no clue about the intangibles. In my first year collegiately, I was amazed at basics that our catchers didn't know when I would let them call pitches in scrimmages. You coaches do an injustice when they don't teach these things.

^^^THIS^^^ This needs to be force fed to a whole bunch of egomaniacal coaches who refuse! Teach this, coach this, let them the players experience this. Not every athlete is going to have the required bandwidth to do a good job calling pitches but develop those that show and aptitude, desire and talent for it!

 

[Hillhouse]

Speaking of success, at the 18U World's in 2018 we had two primary pitchers. One became a Division 1 pitcher at George Washington U. The big girl, 5'8" threw a moderate riseball and a screwball, no drop or effective change-up. The other, all 5'1" threw primarily dropballs an occasional fastball and a about 15% riseballs. I had little faith in the big girl. She was more about expectations than a true performance perspective. In the end the big girl gave up 1/2 as many hits, struck out 200% more batters. She also gave up slightly over half of her hits for extra bases. The little dropball gal gave up twice as many hits, and you follow the rest. But she only gave up one extra base hit the whole tournament. Guess who had the lower ERA? Too many dads vacate the training schedule for the famed rise-ball even if it never quite arrives as an effective pitch.

Are you talking about the USA's team in 18U world's? Wasn't Montana Fouts the USA's #1? I can't comment on what you're saying here specifically but, I remember rather vividly how lucky the USA was in winning.

Again, I am not questioning anything you've said but, I will say 2 thing:

1. TV commentators routinely misidentify a low riseball as a "screwball".

2. ERA's and Strikeouts at WBSC championships can be very misleading. There are a lot of teams who enter the WBSC who are terrible. Fouts could probably strike out 18 batters from India (for example) while throwing left handed. In 2000, I threw a perfect game with 11 K's of 12 batters (I think one guy tried to bunt or something) in South Africa vs. the African nation of Lesotho. Not exactly something to brag about from my perspective. lol

 

[Hillhouse]

^^^THIS^^^ This needs to be force fed to a whole bunch of egomaniacal coaches who refuse! Teach this, coach this, let them the players experience this. Not every athlete is going to have the required bandwidth to do a good job calling pitches but develop those that show and aptitude, desire and talent for it!

My last sentence was supposed to say "YOUTH coaches" Not you coaches. lol.

 

[Tatonka]

My last sentence was supposed to say "YOUTH coaches" Not you coaches. lol.

You, Youth, whatever, lol...I've seen "Youth" coaches get schooled on this topic repeatedly by some of the best position pitchers and catchers to have ever played. They give lip service to it, nodding their heads in agreement and then just completely blow it off and not follow through in practice, scrimmages or real games. Are they afraid, lack the knowledge or tools to teach/coach this skill or what? Is it the issue of giving up control of the game? What is it? This is a different scenario than just being a bad coach and yelling at the players, using negative reinforcement or a ton of other bad coaching behaviors. Often these are excellent coaches in almost every other regard. What is the downside of having a battery that understands?

 

[radness]

What is the downside of having a battery that understands?

SERIOUSLY can this ⬆ be posted in the coaches forum please?

And YES ask the question why some coaches dont/cant/wont teach players pitch calling!

 

[ArmWhip]

Exactly.

I call it Sluggers Paradox: If all these pitchers are throwing so many different kind of pitches, where are these pitches? Why don't we have video of them?

This morning I went back and looked at UCLA vs Ok. It looks to me like Garcia's 'other pitch' is a drop/curve that she throws to the low outside corner. You never see this pitch in slo-mo because it's her bullet rise that gets all the K's. Juarez most common pitch is mid 60's, bulletspin with the spin axis tipped up so that there is a moderate break in to a RH hitter. Reminds me of a baseball slider. However it is difficult to see ball trajectory on TV so I'm going by how the pitch 'looks' to me, I could be way off.

 

[Gags]

I remember all too clearly the trajectory many of Juarez's curveballs took - but that was AFTER they made contact with the sweet spot of the bat. I'm also not yet convinced that UCLA wasn't picking signs or the pitch somehow. IMHO, that last game is a good example of how the best coaches can fail at pitch calling - to my "rookie" eye, OU kept going to the curveball way too often, and UCLA either was sitting on it, or knew it was coming. If the justification is "my job depends on it, so I'm going to call pitches", then you would expect them to also realize when NOT to call the pitch? (Disclaimer: Patty Gasso can probably go sub-.500 the next 5 seasons and still be the HC - the "job depends on it" was more in reference to HS/non-Rock Star-status coaches.)

@Hillhouse - I think Quasimodo was referring to the Philippines' 18U team, not the USA's?

 

[Quasimodo]

I disagree. I think 2 Time Olympic Gold Medalist Michele Smith and her broadcast partner(s) just see where the ball ends up and then call the pitch by that name. Anything high is a rise, low is a drop, etc. Regardless of the rotation, movement, etc. Just just where the catcher catches it for most of them. More than 1/2 the time they misidentify change ups when it has a similar spin as something else. Someone with a really good forward spinning change, they would often call those dropballs instead of seeing how fooled the batter was by the speed. Again, this is from just seeing where the ball ends up instead of what actually happened.

Maybe so, but you will never get me to say it out loud. I did clinics with Michele for many years. Caught her many times. Followed around the Redding Rebels. So I am biased like a mother hen!