The Journey Begins

Welcome to Discuss Fastpitch

Your FREE Account is waiting to the Best Softball Community on the Web.

May 20, 2019
132
43
As promised here is a video from today. We were working on pushback drill and as always working on posture. Still got a long ways to go on posture but getting steady improvement every session.

 
Apr 12, 2015
792
93
1615895904367.png

I know you are working on posture, but you added the dreaded "and" in there. As in, we are working on this AND posture. Just my opinion, but you need to solely focus on the posture until this issue is corrected (the monkey butt, apparent forward lean, and collapse of the stride leg). In the long run, she'll gain far more benefit from correcting posture than anything else you could possibly work on at this point.
 
May 20, 2019
132
43
To be honest we have been working on posture almost exclusively for many months and I am running out of ideas on how to get this corrected. I would love if anyone has anything specific we can try. This posture issue has been kicking our butt. We introduced the halo thing on top of the head that Pauley suggests and it seems she can manage to keep her head still while monkey butting.....grr
 
Apr 12, 2015
792
93
Yeah, it can be a tough and persistent one, and you often have to balance "fixing" the problem and NOT losing the interest of the pitcher.

My suggestion would be to bust up the routine and find things she can do where she throws underhand, but without the wind-up and drive out (which usually reinforce bad posture if it has developed). My DD and I used to field, like she was a shortstop, and she had to make plays throwing the ball underhand.

If you find she can throw underhand with good posture, like playing catch, then you know its her drive that is creating the problem. Usually this is from a weaker pitcher (due to age and underdevelopment, not weakness as a negative term) trying to generate too much force on their drive. Maintaining great posture through a forceful drive requires a tremendous amount of core strength and a lot of younger ladies haven't developed that yet.
 
Apr 17, 2019
331
63
I've had success with the cue 'finish like there's a string on your front hip here, where the bone sticks out a little (indicating leftside of pelvic bone, not hip joint, I'm bad at anatomy.) pulling you to the catcher.'
See if that's enough.
If she collapses into front leg, or falls through the end of the pitch I add 'there's another string pulling the top of your spine up and just a wee bit back'
 
Feb 25, 2020
953
93
Id suggest she wear cleats all the time pitching.

Also maybe try, instead of pushing back(pushing the stride foot away), having her try to bring the stride foot back under her pelvis. Foot lands out front of pelvis and then attempted to be brought back under the pelvis. Sounds wierd but that is what the glutes and hammies do. Those are also the muscles that stand you straight up.

If you watch this running drill at 5:30 that is how the stride foot should be working IMO.(except landing out front for pitching!)



Doing glute bridges as a warm up before pitching can really wake up the glutes as well.



My .02(maybe not even worth that!)
 
May 20, 2019
132
43
@Bonesaw I think you nailed it on the head there. i think she is pushing back with her stride foot on landing which is causing the pelvis to collapse instead of continuing forward and over? I have noticed also that her drive leg just kinda stops instead of following through. Looks like a rainy week this week so we can work on this indoors ;-)
 

Top_Notch

Screwball
Dec 18, 2014
512
63
At the 4 second mark of the video I was impressed to see the ball up at 9:00. This is good.
 
Feb 25, 2020
953
93
@Bonesaw I think you nailed it on the head there. i think she is pushing back with her stride foot on landing which is causing the pelvis to collapse instead of continuing forward and over? I have noticed also that her drive leg just kinda stops instead of following through. Looks like a rainy week this week so we can work on this indoors ;-)

That's another thing that can make posture harder, stride length. Maybe not say "shorten your stride" but having her get the stride foot down sooner/faster/harder might make posture easier to hold on to. She looks nice and tall driving IMO.
 
May 15, 2008
1,913
113
Cape Cod Mass.
She never gets from leaning forward at take off to leaning back at landing. You could focus on a better landing position but I think that going further back upstream might get a better result. She doesn't drive off the rubber with her hips because she's not maximizing the glutes on her drive leg. She's letting her drive leg heel collapse. It's camouflaged a little by the pitching rubber but the foot-shin angle is less than 90 degrees, so the glutes aren't being fully activated. You're doing the pushback drill but not focusing on a key part, the foot-shin angle. If she drives off better it should cause her hips to get out past her shoulders. Once you drive off the rubber the hips have to outpace the shoulders.
 

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
42,830
Messages
679,478
Members
21,445
Latest member
Bmac81802
Top