Went to a tourney, yesterday.

[Amy in AZ.]

I watched about 10 12U pitchers, yesterday in an ASA tournament. The pitching was awful. Also, most of the catchers were awful.

It is no wonder girls start dropping out of softball this early. They aren't being taught how to pitch correctly. Mostly, it is the bending that is the problem. But lack of speed was so evident.

I think that my own students stepped in the circle and lost 10 mph on their fastball. Why? Because their catchers haven't been taught to catch. When I see a young girl and she has her fielding mitt on as a catcher, that is not a good sign.

I don't not catch these girls with anything but a good mitt and a pad inside it. So, will the girls throw hard to someone set up on their toes, feet almost together and a fielders mitt on? Evidently not.

 

[Jojo]

Amy I am with you about the catcher situation.

It is the most common complaint I hear out of my pitchers when they get hit around. I ask them, "Are you moving the ball around? Changing speeds? Using your drop?

No, no and no, "Catcher won't set me up, can't catch a change-up or a drop so coach won't call it."

Most coaches still just want to see speed, no "pitching", but don't want to train the catchers to even handle the ball.

I've even had some of them come out to class and cannot believe they cannot even catch a ball at pitching practice.
Some of my pitchers have to take their turn behind the plate because they can at least "catch" the ball.

 

[tghorley]

I am amazed at the time at practice training pitchers but not the catchers. My GDD played on two tb teams (12u) last year and I would bet she got less than an hour of any training on catching.

But she does have a personal trainer so maybe she knows more than her coaches, who knows. Her personal trainer has worked really hard with her and even lets her catch HS pitchers and a D3 college pitcher. So she has no fear of catching any of the various pitches. Her pitchers have confidence in her and will throw all of their pitches which makes them feel better about themselves. If coaches would only think how much better their pitchers would be with just some catcher training. Maybe its just a time thing.

But then again, maybe the girls don't want to be catchers in the first place.

 

[Catchersmom]

How many times have you seen catcher specific workouts at your practices? I don't mean getting the pitcher warmed up either. I'm talking specific drills and lessons for the catcher’s eyes and ears only? I would venture to say very few if at all.

It's an incredibly unfortunate fact but 95% of the time the catchers are the most under-appreciated and under-prepared players on the field. The pitchers are the stars of the show but the catchers are expected to go out and control the star and control the game with little to no position specific training. Why? From our experience (12U DD has been catching for 4 years) most coaches just expect the kid to be able to simply catch a ball. Most of them don't take into account that while the pitchers are being worked over to place the ball and change the speed and the curve, their catchers aren't being taught the fundamentals of reading the pitch, knowing how to call and set for expected placement.

To all the coaches out there dealing with the frustration of having a catcher that isn't really catching you have to teach them how to do it. There is more to this position than simply stopping a ball. You should be spending just as much time and quality working your catchers as you are your pitchers. And to the parents of beginning catchers do not under estimate the power of this position, they are equally important on field and need just as much time and attention as pitchers do to meet their highest potential.

Finding the right catching coach is no easy feat either. In our area there are easily 9-10x more pitching instructors than there are catching instructors.

 

[John T]

I also think that catching has to be worked on outside of practice nearly as much as pitching. We will do some catcher specific drills and are blessed with enough coached to work one on one with a catcher but when you only have an 1 1/2 hour practice block you should not be spending alot of that on one or two players (Just like pitchers). We are working on defence and hitting.

I have always wondered why there were not more catching coaches/camps. It is a very important position with very specific skills.

 

[starsnuffer]

I coach a B travel ball team, so we can't begin playing tournaments until May (ASA rules). That said, our pre-season workouts began a month ago, and in the hour I have set aside for pitching/catching workouts, the vast majority of that time has been spent on catcher development. Coach Weaver's video's have been awesome for us in that respect. Now that I know enough to pretend that I know what I'm doing in the catching department, I can think back in retrospect and agree with everything Amy said. Catching is abysmal at the lower levels of the sport, with the "amazing" catchers simply being the ones that know how to set up on flat feet and receive the ball properly. It's amazing how much emphasis is put on throwing out the runner at 2nd while the 20 balls that should have been caught/blocked apparently count for nothing (how do you think that runner got there?).

As for pitching. .. this is a tough one, as it really depends on the talent in your particular area. Team coaches don't have the time to develop pitchers, we can only use what we have access to. I encourage, and even offer to provide transportation to my daughters own pitching coach (an hour away), and while I feel that I know enough about pitching to teach it to a degree (I practice myself so I can properly windmill pitch BP to my team), it's simply a matter of the time it takes to invest in building a pitcher.. . someone else besides the coach needs to do it.

-W

 

[Catchersmom]

I couldn't agree more about catchers needing to practice on thier own outside of team practice time. For our part we have our daughter with a catching coach (a Coach Weaver believer) once a week, catching for the #1 and #2 pitchers at thier lessons once a week and doing drills and other mechanical work at home on off nights. DD gets one day a week off leading up to the season starting, a rough life I know but she wouldn't have it any other way.

For our experience we seem run into a lot of coaches who just don't know how to teach catching to even be able to the girls and parents a good start to work on, they're just expecting it to be there when they need it.

John T, luckily we found our catching coach through a very long and drawn out search but I would LOVE see some camps/clinics in our area asap. Wink Wink Catching Coach!

Snuffer- You're right on with the over focus on the throw down to 2nd. Our DD has a cannon for an arm but it means nothing if she has to chase a ball down.

 

[John T]

Our catchers do work with the infield on throwing, bunt coverage etc. in practice, I was thinking more about blocking balls in the dirt, foot work and calling the game.

I would love to have one of our catchers show up when my DD is working with her pitching coach. It would get me off the bucket and I could do a lot more learning standing with the coach and picking his brain.

GREAT TOPIC!

 

[Bishop]

It would be awesome to have our catchers show up to the private pitching lessons for our pitchers. Our catchers are playing basketball league and volleyball for school. Just not available for that. The joy of multisport athletes, only available during season for a given sport. One of four 'catchers' is available to come out and catch private lessons.

 

[starsnuffer]

Do the reverse, make your pitchers show up for your catching work outs. It helps to have extra help throwing balls in the dirt, and pitchers need to learn a few catcher skills anyway (like how to cover home with a runner coming from third) and need to work with the catcher on the proper way to cover home on a passed ball, and spot pop flies for the catcher.

I see teams do "pitcher specific" practice all the time. Pitchers already have private lessons and should already practice a great deal on their own, the team really needs more catcher specific practices in which the pitchers attend.

-W