How to get 'junk' ball pitcher some respect?

[58sdad]

When she hit 60 was she pitching with a 30MPH tailwind?

lol.. no but I got her pretty mad.. She certainly couldn't throw that consistently for more than one or two pitches.. big difference between just fooling around in practice and what you do on the mound in a game.. to say that she is a 60mph pitcher at this point is ludicrous.. but she at least has the physical capability to do so at some point. Right now if she threw 'flamethrower' style she would tire very quickly and become ineffective. Maybe she could do it for an inning or two.. OTOH she can throw that junk all day long.

Main point I wanted to make is that there is more than one way to skin a cat. So many coaches have a narrow mindset when it comes to pitching.. like the old saying goes, "Chicks dig the long ball", well it seems "Coaches dig the Fastball".

Thankfully DD's travel coach digs the junk and she is the #1 on a team made up of girls playing JV and Varsity in our area. We just have to wait 8 more weeks for the school season to be over and start travel.. We will be ready..

Thanks for the great discussion.. I've really enjoyed reading all the different opinions..

 

[cuzmail]

What brand of radar is being used to determine how fast these girls are throwing?

Ding Ding. Chicken dinner here please!

 

[GOINGDEEP]

What brand of radar is being used to determine how fast these girls are throwing?

We use the Hasbro Easy Make 65 MPH gun.

 

[58sdad]

We use the Hasbro Easy Make 65 MPH gun.

lol.. since it's been asked, I do it the old fashioned way.. with math.. Radar will only measure the speed at a point in time.. there is a vast difference between when it leaves her hand and when it crosses the plate. The only way to get the average velocity is to measure the time from release to the catcher's glove.. now there is some distance fudge factor as the pitcher releases the ball in front of the rubber and the catcher is behind the plate, but for my purposes I assume those cancel each other out more or less..

while i have timed pitchers live, it's more accurate to do it with video.. at 30fps the most you can miss by is +/- .03 seconds on the release.. i use the sound from the catcher's glove to measure the stop time, so not accounting for the speed of sound to reach the microphone it's pretty much dead on..

That being said DD is pretty consistently in the .55 to .58 seconds for the ball to get from her hand to the catcher's glove @43 ft. Her record is .49, but again as I have said previously.. this is NOT the norm. It was a one shot deal.

you are welcome to double check my math, but .55 seconds at 43ft equates to 54mph avg velocity and .58 is around 50mph. I'll measure a dozen pitches or so in a session to mitigate the innaccuracies of my methodology.

I don't trust the accuracy of most of the cheap radar guns on the market, most of them are junk. The pro models are a little out of my reach especially for what I would be doing with it.

That being said, the numbers in this case don't matter.. the fact the the flamethrowers get all the love is what this thread was about..

 

[JAD]

lol.. since it's been asked, I do it the old fashioned way.. with math.. Radar will only measure the speed at a point in time.. there is a vast difference between when it leaves her hand and when it crosses the plate. The only way to get the average velocity is to measure the time from release to the catcher's glove.. now there is some distance fudge factor as the pitcher releases the ball in front of the rubber and the catcher is behind the plate, but for my purposes I assume those cancel each other out more or less..

while i have timed pitchers live, it's more accurate to do it with video.. at 30fps the most you can miss by is +/- .03 seconds on the release.. i use the sound from the catcher's glove to measure the stop time, so not accounting for the speed of sound to reach the microphone it's pretty much dead on..

That being said DD is pretty consistently in the .55 to .58 seconds for the ball to get from her hand to the catcher's glove @43 ft. Her record is .49, but again as I have said previously.. this is NOT the norm. It was a one shot deal.

you are welcome to double check my math, but .55 seconds at 43ft equates to 54mph avg velocity and .58 is around 50mph. I'll measure a dozen pitches or so in a session to mitigate the innaccuracies of my methodology.

I don't trust the accuracy of most of the cheap radar guns on the market, most of them are junk. The pro models are a little out of my reach especially for what I would be doing with it.

That being said, the numbers in this case don't matter.. the fact the the flamethrowers get all the love is what this thread was about..

Calculating speed this way is similar to using a RevFire. This method will produce an 'average' speed over the 43' distance, and your DD's max speed will probably be a couple of MPH faster since the ball begins to decelerates (or acceletates negatively) the second it is released by the pitcher (see thread regarding high school physics lessons for some mathmatically challeged dad she swears his DD pitches ACCELERATE half way between the pitching rubber and home plate)......

 

[58sdad]

Calculating speed this way is similar to using a RevFire. This method will produce an 'average' speed over the 43' distance, and your DD's max speed will probably be a couple of MPH faster since the ball begins to decelerates (or acceletates negatively) the second it is released by the pitcher (see thread regarding high school physics lessons for some mathmatically challeged dad she swears his DD pitches ACCELERATE half way between the pitching rubber and home plate)......

yeah i read that thread .. it was kind of funny.. comparing it to a rocket ship like a softball has an engine or something.. lol.. Newton was rolling over in his grave..

but yes you are correct it is an average velocity over the 43'. if you gun a girl with the ball at release you are going to get a couple mph faster than if you gun the ball at the plate.

 

[Jojo]

My DD was considered a junk baller. And yes it was harder for her to get respect. She always did throw hard for her age, but I made sure we practiced religiously on spins because I knew as she got older that speed wasn't going to do her any favors, she was of average height and build so no genetic gifts where available for her.

In a typical game, facing a "flame thrower", the flame thrower would get like 8 k's in the game. My DD probably 4-5. But she would usually leave the game with a win and most likely a shut-out. But the flame thrower would get more respect.

She kept the balls breaking on and off the corners, every pitch had a different speed, her horizontal pitches could be thrown at a change of speed and a backdoor and it didn't hurt she had a nasty rise and screw. If you watched her warm up, she wasn't that much to look at, but get in the box and you could never get comfortable or try and get any kind of timing.

 

[halskinner]

In the NSA California State Championship tournament in 2002, I believe, I had a 10 under very talented student pitch her team to the win. She threw 1 game Friday, 3 on saturday and, with the exception of the first inning of the first game, she pitched 5 games on Sunday. SShe was considered to be a junkballer bu t she DEFINITELY commanded respect and fear from the other teams.

She had several movement pitches she could throw at any speed she chose between 35 and 55mph. SHE COULD BRING IT.

She could throw any of those with 3 different wind ups and used several other pitching tactics as well.

She averaged 14 ks per game with a high of 17 ks one game. At the end of the tournament the NSA State UIC congratulated her and told her and her Dad that he had watched her pitch in every game and hers was the most brilliant pitching performance he had ever seen in his 25 years of being an umpire.

In a tough NorCal league championship two junkballer students of mine faced off against each other

. Pitcher for team A had 21 straight strike outs. Pitcher for team B had 17 strike outs, fanned the first 14 batters in a row.

All 3 of those pitchers got a ton of respect.

It's like anything else in life, get good at it and the respect will follow you.

 

[Amy in AZ.]

I began the morning by looking for info on junk ball pitchers. Little did I know, that is was right here.

One of my best students began spinning the ball, Sat. She was very effective. She is a 12 yo. I am guessing she can throw a straight fastball about 43 mph. She is compact and does not use her legs.

Because of this no legs deal, I am trying to figure her out. I do not want to coach something out of her, that is coming naturally. Through 14 rec games her earned run average is 1.12. But the spinning started Sat. She had given up 3 hits on singles when I saw her "click." She just started spinning everything in, low and outside.

I have spent 3 years trying to get her to leap out. So, if she is happy and her folks are happy, I am giving her the green light to "spin away."

 

[BT3100]

People love the heat....
My DD is a speed pitcher. She can get it up there 55 MPH at 12... Her off speed is weak but Screw and drop are decent. Her teammate is a spin pitcher. Cant touch 50 but has great control and movement. She doesn't get the respect that DD does. I think it's unfair but coaches love speed.