Wrist confusion

[treeguy]

My DD is a some-what beginning pitcher. She is getting a late start at pitching. Just turned 14 and starting over on pitching. Trying to get ready for HS ball. She primarily throws fastball, flip change and drop. She has always had a real good snap on her fastball. Since starting to throw the roll-over drop she is starting to lose the good fastball snap. Many times her fastball release is somewhere between the fastball and drop. Occasionally it even comes out with the flip change release. She is just having trouble singling out each release, sometimes throwing a combination of two spins on her fastball.

Is this just going to take repitition to correct? Or is there something else we can try? Sometimes I think it's just a lack of focus, but I can see the frustration in her when she combines two spins and can't throw her fastball as well as she is capable. Pitching coach suggested throwing three fastballs to every drop, trying to make sure the fastball has the right snap. Just looking for any additional input. I'm sure this is fairly common with new pitchers. Thanks.

 

[Gbucz]

I have to agree, this is normal. Repetition and attention to detail will help her sort things out. The ball on a stick may help some. The ball with a taped line around it will also help her see when the pitch is working.

 

[treeguy]

Thanks for the help. I figured she just needed to work through it. I guess I was looking for confirmation that it's a normal part of the process. She has been making great progress. The mixing pitches just has us both a little frustrated.

 

[CoachFP]

In the long term (like next 6 months to year) I would learn the rise (start with ball on the stick) and take out the fastball. I would use the ball on the stick to practice the rollover spin to get that conditioned in. I would not increase fastballs because you use those in warm up etc. You get plenty.

It is normal.

Screwball, you would take a player who is just starting pitching and teach her the riseball? It's going to take a year to get control and speed with an acceptable changeup. I'd worry about the basic stuff first.

 

[Mike-Coach Q]

Without pictures it's only a guess. If she throws her fastball with her hand on top of the ball ,like a peel drop, at release and is learning to throw the turn over from under the ball, she might be mixing up the different hand position.

 

[Rich Balswick]

Yes I would. The rise is not as intimidating as made out to be. If she can handle the rollover, the rise is a cake walk.

Plus she started late for a pitcher, already shows dedication to learning the spins. However, I see the term starting over which tells me the basics were there already.

She just does not have time to tinker around (will be over in a blink) esp with how good HS age hitters are today.

A change can be taught concurrently but the poster did not bring that up as an issue so I did not go there. I teach the change at about the 3rd to 4th lesson for any new pitcher. Also, control up and down on the fastball is not necessary to learn if you have a rise and drop. That's why we throw them. Alot of that is just what I call paying your dues, because later won't be used. 14 is the age when those take over for fastballs. The low fastball is the first to go (what a pain that pitch is).

In and out control can be done with both fastball and rise.

Screwball, you say " if she can handle a rollover, the rise is a piece of cake". You must be an absolutely amazing teacher. I can't even begin to relate to that statement and I might add that the number of truly effective rise balls being thrown out there are few and far between.

 

[Rich Balswick]

No, the kids are amazing and not hampered by all the naysayers (they don't know you exist). The pitch has been around for decades and has multiple grips that work, and many of the old-timers to teach it and pass it on with 'positive spin.' The motion follows the natural fastball motion only with your hand cocked to the side.

The reason the rise is hated and denigrated so much is that it is not from baseball (guys hate that) AND people can't get over the death of the fastball in women's fastpitch.

We will keep on trucking with what we are doing. My riseballer in HS just got promoted to number 1 pitcher over two seniors.

SS. Screwball - you make some amazing assumptions: contrary to your inference I believe the rise ball is one of the key pitches to be mastered and when you say the fastball is being phased out of the women's game ( inferring that men are resisting this) I never heard the term fastball in Fastpitch for 30 years until being exposed to the women's game in the early 80's- in fact I still don't know what a fastball is in Fastpitch.

 

[Rich Balswick]

SS. Screwball - you make some amazing assumptions: contrary to your inference I believe the rise ball is one of the key pitches to be mastered and when you say the fastball is being phased out of the women's game ( inferring that men are resisting this) I never heard the term fastball in Fastpitch for 30 years until being exposed to the women's game in the early 80's- in fact I still don't know what a fastball is in Fastpitch.

( I had to stop for awhile to get to my computer- my Iphone was running out of juice. ) As I continue I'm going to try to more directly address the thread- " Wrist confusion "

From my experience and orientation the wrist confusion starts with the way the vast majority of coaches are starting kids out by showing them to release the ball with their palm facing home plate and snapping up. This orientation also generally includes a locked out arm, palm down or towards 2nd base at 9:00, and forcing the ball forward without any I/R thru a snapping up release. As a result of this most kids create a twisting out spiraling release to keep the ball from going over the backstop. ( It's my understanding that a former very famous college pitcher who now coaches was encouraging one of my students to actually work on throwing the ball over the backstop to help increase her speed and she already threw 62 as a Junior High Student using I/R etc.) So, anyhow I spend a lot of time breaking kids from that kind of confusion. To me wrist confusion is reduced when pitchers are basically taught to have the radius bone of the wrist being mostly in front when the ball is being spun forward for the drops (roll and peel ) and the ulna bone of the wrist being in the lead when the rise or curve is thrown. Any other wrist orientation thru the release of a softball pitch messes up young developing pitchers big time. ( I've just painted a very general picture here I know.)

By the way, I was being a little facetious when I said I didn't know what a fastball was because I have seen many versions of them thru the years. Most so called fastballs that I've seen thru the years has neither the radius bone or ulna bone of the wrist in the lead at release resulting most often in a non-descrip spin ( generally a little spirally ) or the ulna bone of the wrist somewhat in the lead resulting in a lot of spiral.

 

[Rich Balswick]

Talking about the wrist position is an incomplete subject when one is actually trying to define an actual pitch;so I'm going to add the hand here for a bit to describe the picture I want to develop in a beginning students head. Almost every student that comes to me for help is being taught to have their middle finger pointing straight down behind the ball at 6:00 at release to create 6:00 to 12:00 spin. That 6:00 position then tends to cause the thumb to point to 2:00 at release and the ball ends up with 8:00 to 2:00 spin which won't move effectively. I say if you want to spin the ball from 6:00 to 12:00 you need to get your thumb down towards the front of the ball at 12:00 at release which will cause your middle finger to be closer to 4:30 at release which from my experience produces the
effective 6:00 to 12:00 spin. ( This is for a right handed pitcher and it helps getting the wrist into an effective position and eliminates the spiraling tendencies. ) ( the clock is on the floor with 12:00 towards home plate)

 

[Rich Balswick]

Rich:
You think every comment is about you and not in response to other posters.

You seem to feel that pitching is some kind of dogma and that all the rest of us teach the wrong things (whether you know so or not), It is the same old tired speech, no one's rise ball rises (except yours I guess), everyone throws 9 pitches and they all suck, everyone teaches hello elbow but you, yada yada yada... that the rest of us need to be saved by you or our students need to be saved by you from doom. We are not all that bad.

Who teaches bullet spin anymore and what does that have to do with the issue presented? Good grief.

If you need to talk this much about a kid learning a drop versus fastball who may not get the hand position perfectly every time and is working through it, that says it all....How awful lessons must be, even if the point is valid, if the kid has to find the ulna bone. I guess we have to find it because we are going to break it hitting our hip on the release for control.

Hey pitching students and parents, let's do it, stop the instructor yapping, and not get picked apart with a speech shall we?

Screwball (I guess this will have to get personal to some degree and I know you don't care)- Some time ago now, Michelle Smith said on National television that"probably over 90% of the pitching instruction that goes on in women's fastpitch has little to do with the way world class pitchers pitch". When she said that I nearly jumped into the TV screen in agreement. If that is true, the question I ask is why- and from my California perspective I say "misinformation" got started here in the early 80's by well-meaning influential men with baseball backgrounds and it spread like wildfire as the gospel of fastpitching across the Nation and literally thousands and thousands of girls were indeed victimized to some degree by this,what proved to be, "misinformation". So when students come to me here today in Calif., almost everyone of them is still victimized by this "parroted information" that has been passed down for the last 30 years. I don't think I'm the SAVIOR; but I am working to make a difference with what I hope is more effective information gleaned from identifying what the best in the world do today. Perhaps your world doesn't encounter this baggage; but it is still here in my world every day with sincere people looking for more effective answers coming from all over the state literally. (In regards to being the Savior, I noticed you have over 1100 posts in three years.)