In the beginning...9 and 10 y/o's

[Lozza]

- I am not a big fan of starting out with the glove over the head, just seems to be wasted movement, but many claim it is only stylistic (i,e, Cat Ostermann) and has no impact on pitching mechanics. I'm not 100% convinced of that.

As someone who uses it, it is purely stylestic. It gets me into the rhythm much better than a smaller pump does. No extra effort is required on the pitcher's part at all.

 

[lhowser]

Couple of questions? What pitches does she use in the game and in what sequence or pitch counts? 3 walks in 7 innings is great. Is she getting lots of strikeouts, ground balls outs, etc.

She does get a lot of strikeouts but last year when we did see the big dogs they hit the ball pretty hard at times.

We'll usually start with a fastball outside. We may stay there for a while if it is working with blue and the other team is showing little skill at hitting it. I like to see her use her drop to get her second strike or occassionally a change for the second (she throws a turnover drop that is quite a bit slower than her fastball). Then I will come back with a fastball off of the plate and nibble outside to get the out (The change and drop are a little risky at 10U because of the risk of dropped third strike). 3-2 count...it's right down the middle unless it's a really strong hitter. Then we'll work outside and hope for the best.

I like her throwing inside and I will go there early against a good team before they see to many pitches at an at bat. helps her earn a little more of the outside of the plate. We'll go inside maybe first pitch on occassion or after numorous foul balls on outside stuff and a failed change.

 

[sluggers]

<a href="http://share.ovi.com/media/ratwod.softball/ratwod.12513"><img src="http://media.share.ovi.com/m1/lt/2650/0fafb5f3f9884be6866475dcc162e295.jpg" border="0" title="april-sequence - Share on Ovi" alt="april-sequence - Share on Ovi" width="280" height="101" /></a>

Attached is her sequence.

BODY POSITION

(1) At 12, she has her left foot down. The left foot should be off the ground at 12 by 2-4 inches. So, her body is "ahead" of where she should be...so, that error throws off her timing throughout the pitch.
(2) At 9, her torso has started moving forward.
(3) At release, her torso is to far over her right foot. Her torso should be between her left foot and her right foot.

OPEN

(1) At 12, you can see that she is "throwing the mitt" to her left. Some pitchers do this, but it doesn't twist the upper body. Your DD is throwing the mitt so hard it is twisting her upper body closed. So, she isn't open at 12. Again, this is going to be reflected throughout her entire throwing motion.
(2) At 9, she is (naturally) too closed.
(3) Which, at release, forces her to be too closed.

Generally, she looks pretty good. She has some nice IR going on. She needs to work on "staying back" and "staying open". I would recommend the stork drill.

 

[lhowser]

Slugger,

Very good input and observations. I am right with you and the thumbnails show it. Now, I am trying to really determine what is going on "under the hood" to create these symptoms. Changing muscle memory is hard work. I think you only get a few cracks at major changes. A lot of habits get engrained early so I am trying to determine how to "plan" for her improvement rather that just "react" as I see things. One thing I notice that I don't like and I am trying to determine what consequences it creates is the possible over rotation (to open) of her hips and knee. She is improving this but still does it a little. Watch how her left knee stops driving forward as she opens and it briefly turns inward. This has to effect her hip angle as well and thus her stretch with her upper torso. I have noticed with many clips there is an offset and the shoulders open more than the hips creating a stretch like a rubber band. I wonder if this is a place where her upper body starts to get too far over her lower half and the left shoulder and glove start to close too quickly.

Also trying to determine why she gets to toe touch too early. I am not convinced that pushing out further or higher will help this.

Any thoughts?

 

[sluggers]

trying to determine why she gets to toe touch too early. I am not convinced that pushing out further or higher will help this.

Understand that we are talking about the "body in relation to the arm". So, when we say the "body is ahead" or "toe touch is early", we could also say "the arm is late." So, you can slow down the body or speed up the arm. Her arm will rotate faster as she gets older.

So, my suggestion is to do the stork drills (pitching on one leg) and then do three pump drills (get open, and have her do three rotations of the arm, and then throw the ball on third rotation).

The more I've thought about this, perhaps you need to spend some time simply on her arm movement. Her arm motion is a little screwy. Perhaps you just forget about the body for a while and work just on the arm.

Screwball, IR (internal rotation) is the anatomically correct term for the arm movement during release. It is the rotation of a body part toward the center of the body. In the case of pitching, it refers to the lateral rotation of the arm toward the center. In baseball, they refer to the similar motion as "external rotation". So, it makes some amount of sense to call it "IR".

Some pitching instructors insist on students "flipping" the ball on a fastball. The term "IR" helps distinguish between those students throwing a fastball correctly and those students trying to "flip" the ball. A number of pitching instructors teach flipping the ball rather than IR.