Shoulder position at release?

[daywalkerdad]

Definitely dont want the shoulders in line with 2B and Home at release so not sure why she wouldve been told that.

Sarah Pauly Arm Circle

Should say I am getting this 3rd party from a teen. Sometimes leaves a lot to be desired. That is why I asked.

 

[PJR202]

I believe the statistic I was taught is hips square with shoulder/hip/knee aligned and the torso about 45 degrees (edited from 15 after reading northball's post. that seems more accurate in my recollection now) behind the hips. I see a lot of high level girls throwing with hips and shoulders perpendicular, so I'll go out on a limb and say that 45 degrees is up for debate.

This also can come down to whether the pitcher is throwing whip or straight arm. I've seen girls just about in line with 2B/home but they were super early openers and throwing with a straight arm. Most girls with the hips completely open are still rotating the torso ahead a bit. I've noticed some that throw completely wide open will shrug their shoulders, which I presume is to get the arm as close to the body as possible. There are some really strange mechanics out there.

 

[Northball]

Simplistic view of this:
Face home plate and use your pitching arm to do arm circles, keeping your hand perfectly over a power line to home plate the whole time. Not easy, and kind of "Ouch!" if you're not careful.
Next, face 3rd base and do arm circles keeping your hand perfectly over the same power line. Doesn't hurt, but still awkward.
Finally, turn 45 degrees toward home and do the arm circles. Again, hand perfectly above the same power line. Pretty dang easy.

Don't fight your own body.

 

[daywalkerdad]

The only ones I see with shoulders more in line with 2nd and the plate are men's fastpitch pitchers.

I saw that also. Only saw one man with a drag and not replanting, and he looked much like the elite women.

 

[ArmWhip]

The only ones I see with shoulders more in line with 2nd and the plate are men's fastpitch pitchers.

It's hard to extrapolate anything from the men's game because the mechanics are so different. The open shoulders, with open hips, the body lean to throwing arm side, the push off leg trailing way behind and to the glove arm side.

 

[Hillhouse]

I saw that also. Only saw one man with a drag and not replanting, and he looked much like the elite women.

I'd be curious which man you saw that you're referring to.

It's hard to extrapolate anything from the men's game because the mechanics are so different. The open shoulders, with open hips, the body lean to throwing arm side, the push off leg trailing way behind and to the glove arm side.

Interesting take. I like to think I pride myself on teaching my students to pitch the same way that I did in my own career. I think far too many people confuse the different RULES (or lack of) in men's fastpitch with the mechanics used for throwing the ball. They are 2 very different things. When I do speaking engagements at coaches clinics, and I use a Power point presentation, part of the presentation is covering the Absolutes vs. Styles differentials. In this, I take pictures of myself and I use 4 different women's pics of us both being in the same point in the wind-up: the load, the 12:00 position, release point and follow through. The pictures are initially side by side to see the similarities, then I can take my pic and put it directly on top of the woman's pic where you can see we are in virtually identical positions. It's been a minute since I've done the presentation but I'm 99% sure the 4 women I used in my examples are, Osterman, Finch, Lawrie, and 2 Time Olympic Gold Medalist Michele Smith. Now to be clear, this is not done in an attempt to say that my career is superior to any of these ladies. But it's done to disprove the incorrect notion that the mechanics are different. Mechanics are not different for males/females when teaching someone to throw overhand. They run bases the same way. Now hitting people say the swing is identical (baseball/softball). But only when it comes to pitching that people try to say there's all these differences. I believe this to be non-sense. Yes, the men can throw harder even with incorrect mechanics due to pure strength. But that does not mean they're throwing with correct mechanics. In fact, I'd take it further and say a good argument could be made that more men throw with bad mechanics than good mechanics. But their speed still looks impressive because of strength not sound pitching fundamentals.

What makes Jordy Bahl so good? It's certainly not because she is 6'1 or 6'2 like a couple pitchers on the last US Olympic team. Jordy has very sound mechanics but her biggest advantage is that she never spent any time with a H/E coach that taught her to do wrist snaps, pointing the ball towards 2nd base, locked elbow, and all the other stuff we all love about H/E pitching coaches. She didn't have to unlearn all the H/E crap and didn't start out doing all of those things which teach poor muscle memory. There's some very good pitchers out there who could've been GREAT pitchers if they hadn't had to spend time unlearning things. I could go on and on about that but, I already tend to make my posts longer than intended.

 

[daywalkerdad]

I'd be curious which man you saw that you're referring to.


Interesting take. I like to think I pride myself on teaching my students to pitch the same way that I did in my own career. I think far too many people confuse the different RULES (or lack of) in men's fastpitch with the mechanics used for throwing the ball. They are 2 very different things. When I do speaking engagements at coaches clinics, and I use a Power point presentation, part of the presentation is covering the Absolutes vs. Styles differentials. In this, I take pictures of myself and I use 4 different women's pics of us both being in the same point in the wind-up: the load, the 12:00 position, release point and follow through. The pictures are initially side by side to see the similarities, then I can take my pic and put it directly on top of the woman's pic where you can see we are in virtually identical positions. It's been a minute since I've done the presentation but I'm 99% sure the 4 women I used in my examples are, Osterman, Finch, Lawrie, and 2 Time Olympic Gold Medalist Michele Smith. Now to be clear, this is not done in an attempt to say that my career is superior to any of these ladies. But it's done to disprove the incorrect notion that the mechanics are different. Mechanics are not different for males/females when teaching someone to throw overhand. They run bases the same way. Now hitting people say the swing is identical (baseball/softball). But only when it comes to pitching that people try to say there's all these differences. I believe this to be non-sense. Yes, the men can throw harder even with incorrect mechanics due to pure strength. But that does not mean they're throwing with correct mechanics. In fact, I'd take it further and say a good argument could be made that more men throw with bad mechanics than good mechanics. But their speed still looks impressive because of strength not sound pitching fundamentals.

What makes Jordy Bahl so good? It's certainly not because she is 6'1 or 6'2 like a couple pitchers on the last US Olympic team. Jordy has very sound mechanics but her biggest advantage is that she never spent any time with a H/E coach that taught her to do wrist snaps, pointing the ball towards 2nd base, locked elbow, and all the other stuff we all love about H/E pitching coaches. She didn't have to unlearn all the H/E crap and didn't start out doing all of those things which teach poor muscle memory. There's some very good pitchers out there who could've been GREAT pitchers if they hadn't had to spend time unlearning things. I could go on and on about that but, I already tend to make my posts longer than intended.

They are slightly different angles but this is what I found. He does appear to be throwing something other than a fastball.

 

[Hillhouse]

They are slightly different angles but this is what I found. He does appear to be throwing something other than a fastball.

Yea, it's hard to tell based off the angle and maybe some interference with the fence as to what Jerry (Jeremy Manley) is throwing there. Now he's a guy who had incredible spin on the ball, and for a stretch of time he was the best pitcher in the world. Not the fastest, those are different things. And the irony of all ironies is, he's one of the very very few male pitchers at that level who did a small backswing instead of keeping the ball hidden. So, it's a testament to how good he was that even when he showed everyone the ball, and his grip, he was still one of the best. Now, to be fair, his rise and dropball grips were extremely similar. I know is drop grip was 2 fingers, straight across the horseshoe, which is the same way virtually everyone does theirs too. And his rise was the fingers in the same place, except his index finger would be putting the finger tip into the . I'm fairly certain he would often change his grip in mid motion. So, for example, the hitter would see the 2 fingers on the ball and believe a dropball was coming. Then, during the circle, he'd just cock the finger tip into the ball. It's a very easy thing to do, and I would often change my grip in mid-motion too if I thought the other team had a pick on me. I have ZERO clue how he threw his change up. Also: fun fact: Jeremy (we'd sometimes call him Jerry) is now the pitching coach at Arizona State. Fun fact #2: In the 2005 world championship, he and I pitched against each other. I had an 11 2/3 inning no hitter, and lost. True story. We may have had 1 hit, I don't remember. But the truth is, we could STILL be playing that game and my team wasn't going to score off him. "You throw shutouts, we'll tie them!" was the team slogan.

 

[ArmWhip]

When I do speaking engagements at coaches clinics, and I use a Power point presentation, part of the presentation is covering the Absolutes vs. Styles differentials.

If you ever give this talk in the NE let me know and I'll attend. I don't recall seeing video of your motion so I can't comment on your comparisons. I looked around for slo-mo video of men's fastpitch pitchers and I found this on Rick Pauly's site, it's Adam Folkard. He may be on the extreme end of the spectrum but his mechanics contain the same characteristics that I see in the majority of the men's fastpitch pitchers in the tournaments posted on line.




These are the things that catch my eye and differ from what I see with most women pitchers.

At 9 o'clock;
he is already fully open, so are his hips, when his hips are open fully I think his belt buckle points back to the SS.

Both feet are off the ground and his back leg is beginning to swing over toward first base.

At landing he is tilted back and also to the right, his push off leg has swung heavily toward first base.

At release he is still mostly open, he makes this work because he is leaning back and strongly tilted to the right and his hips are still mostly open, otherwise the ball/hand wouldn't clear the hips.

After release, because he so strongly tilted, he lurches to the right.

Also, at no time does his glove/arm get left of the power line (I hate that term).

Here is another Folkard video, if you want to view it in slo-mo go the settings on the bottom of the screen and change the playback speed to .25.

 

[tomorrow]

Besgrove number 57 for Gremlins is another good example.