I need a good drill or two to get a 10U girl pushing off. She's got decent mechanics overall, just no explosiveness toward the plate. I've tried setting a line and extending it out every few pitches, but all she does is try to take a bigger step. No push. I'm finally at the point where I'm telling her to "do what so and so does", but that's not necessarily a good coaching tactic I know. Of course, my PC is on a plane to Italy right now, so she's not an option...and practice is in 3 hours!
Push Off Drills
- Thread starter ranstl
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- Oct 20, 2009
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What I do is called a "Walk-Thru" drill. Have the girl stand a few steps behind the rubber and walk straight towards home plate. If she is a right handed pitcher, have her measure her steps so that her right foot (load leg) hits half the rubber and the dirt and push off towards home into her pitching motion. You should do a few to demonstrate so that she can see the explosiveness in your movements and then have her try. This really works well and you will see a definite improvement in the length of her stride the more she practices this drill.
Try the bucket drill...Have her sit on a bucket towards the forward edge of the bucket, her stride foot slightly in front of the bucket...she then should push off, not just standup and go into her motion, but push hard using the pivot foot into her delivery...The goal is to explode into K position from the bucket.
