Hello Elbow - When did that start and why?

[Nunthia1914]

and how do you decipher the good from the bad?

 

[Lozza]

I can remember in the mid 90s being taught to make a fist with my hand.

 

[left turn]

I know at least 3 pitching coaches in our area that teach hello elbow. The young ladies make the pitch and after follow through, they bring their elbow up to point their elbow to the target.

The pitching coach will correct them if they don’t point the elbow. It’s really strange to see.

Even though hello elbow is added on after the pitch is already gone it negatively affects the motion. At best, hello elbow is irrelevant but takes emphasis away from something useful. At its worst, it looks like it stops internal rotation.

Some of the pitchers have a fairly good process and get some internal rotation action before they quickly pull the elbow up into position. My DD has batting in an adjacent tunnel to one of these teachers and it is really hard to stay quiet. I can’t imagine a scenario where the parent or the teacher would listen.

 

[Jojo]

I know at least 3 pitching coaches in our area that teach hello elbow. The young ladies make the pitch and after follow through, they bring their elbow up to point their elbow to the target.

The pitching coach will correct them if they don’t point the elbow. It’s really strange to see.

Even though hello elbow is added on after the pitch is already gone it negatively affects the motion. At best, hello elbow is irrelevant but takes emphasis away from something useful. At its worst, it looks like it stops internal rotation.

Some of the pitchers have a fairly good process and get some internal rotation action before they quickly pull the elbow up into position. My DD has batting in an adjacent tunnel to one of these teachers and it is really hard to stay quiet. I can’t imagine a scenario where the parent or the teacher would listen.

They won't. Whenever I get a new student we go over internal rotation, I pass out a hand-out where it shows the still shots of a release using internal rotation, I show them high quality pitchers all using it, and some of them later down the road will go to another instructor and the first thing that new instructor will do is force them to hello elbow, and they'll do it.

I had one recently to this and she's blaming me for her DD not being able to throw strikes now because I taught her DD an improper follow through and she's struggling to make the corrections with the new PC.

 

[Stand an]

The area I live in is completely saturated with h/e pitchers except one I saw last week. All of them taught by the same instructor, h/s down to u-10. Finding an I/r pitching instructor in s/e wisconsin is like looking for a needle in a haystack. Where and when it started? Idk.

 

[Amy in AZ.]

Perhaps if someone wrote an article for one of the major coaching publications, we could get some instructors to re-think what they are teaching.

 

[Hit by the Pitch]

I think it looks good on the blackboard. If I was sitting around on the coach thinking about pitching HE makes a lot of sense.

 

[left turn]

I think it looks good on the blackboard. If I was sitting around on the coach thinking about pitching HE makes a lot of sense.

I hear what you are saying but the h/e action happens after the pitch is released. And it affects the pitching mechanics before the pitch is released as well. Many or the h/e pitchers in our area deliver the pitch and then afterwards, dutifully point the elbow towards the target.